Reading events of the past, present, and future
by Percabeth4life
Summary: Join our favorite demigods as they travel back in time to the winter solstice the year before Percy goes to camp. The bolt hasn't been stolen yet. Some people from both camps will be there and other guests will join later! Jason is jealous and Percy is Powerful in this one so if you don't like those then this isn't for you:) R
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This whole story will be in 3rd person unless it says otherwise! I own nothing!**

* * *

**Getting the books**

It was a normal day at camp half blood. Everyone was talking and having a good time. Cabin 9 was working on the Argo II and Annabeth, Piper, and Jason were helping as well. When the three plus Leo took a break, a light engulfed them all.

**On Olympus**

Everyone was arguing like usual. Zeus and Poseidon about which domain was better, Aphrodite, Hephaestus, Hera, and Ares about the relationship between the three, Hades and Demeter were arguing over Persephone, Artemis and Apollo over who was older, Athena was yelling at Hermes for a prank he just did on her, and Dionysus was just staring at a wine magazine. Yep it was just a normal winter solstice. A light then appeared and after it was gone, there were 4 teenagers looking confused. Another light then appeared and after it was gone in its place were 4 other teens and a book with a note attached to it. Then the teens came together and they started whispering among themselves until Zeus yelled,

"Who are you and why are you here?! How dare you interrupt a solstice meeting!"

Upon hearing this, a girl about 16 with blonde hair and grey eyes stepped forward.

"I'm Annabeth Chase daughter of Athena and for what we are doing here we do not know. One more question, Olympus was redesigned so why does it look like it wasn't? Wait what year is it?"

Athena answered,

"It is 2000 why?"

Annabeth and the rest of the teens looked shocked at hearing this. Annabeth replied in a surprised voice,

"We're from 2011(don't know if the date is right)! Why are we here?"

Athena then replied,

"I do not know daughter but why is there a book on the ground?"

Annabeth picked it up and went wide eyed. Another teen wearing a hunters outfit with a tiara on top looked over Annabeth's shoulder and gasped as well. Zeus getting impatient asked,

"Well what is it?"

Annabeth replied,

"It's a book and it's about a friend of ours Percy Jackson."

After hearing this Poseidon stiffened.

It couldn't be his son could it? He was only 11 and he didn't want him to be going to camp anytime soon. Poseidon was saved when Athena asked,

"There is a note attached to it. Read it please and then state your names and who your parent is."

Annabeth picked up the note and read,

_Dear Olympians and future demigods,_

_We have decided that the demigods who haven't met Perseus before read about what he has done. Also, the Olympians of the past shall read with them to help them better prepare for what is to come but be warned, DO NOT harm the demigods or try to change the future for you cannot mess with fate. There are 6 books that you must read and the demigods will not be returned until they do so. Other people might join along the way. The first book is called Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief. Don't make assumptions until the book is over._

_Sincerely,_

_The Fates_

After that, the girl wearing the hunters outfit said,

"I'm Thalia Grace daughter of Zeus and lieutenant of Artemis. Jason is my full brother by both father and mother."

"What happened to Zoe?" Artemis asked.

"She is with the stars," replied Thalia sadly.

"Way to ruin the fun Thalia. Anyway I'm Jason Grace son of Jupiter and praetor of the Twelfth Legion."

Apollo being well Apollo asked, "Why is there a roman with the greeks?"

Jason replied, "the future is pretty messed up."

Next a boy with curly black hair and dark brown eyes stepped up. "I'm Leo Valdez son of the awesome god Hephaestus and fire user!" Just for show he lit his hand on fire while giving his dad a smile who returned the gesture.

Then, a pretty girl with choppy brown hair and kaleidoscope eyes said,

"I'm Piper McLean daughter of Aphrodite and charmspeaker."

She smiled to her mother and Aphrodite did the same while thinking that she should be paired with someone handsome like Jason.

A girl with brown hair and brown eyes stepped forward,

"I am Clarisse La Rue daughter of Ares and the Drakon slayer!"

Ares looks up and nods at her.

Finally two boys who looked almost identical stepped forward and grinned hugely,

"I'm Travis,"

"And I'm Connor,"

"Stoll!" they both said together.

"Sons of the best god Hermes!" Again they said together.

Athena spoke up,

"Now that the introductions have been made lets read. Who wants to read?"

Thalia replied,

"I will." Zeus made chairs appear for each one and Thalia said is a strong voice, "Chapter 1…


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: This whole story will be in 3rd person unless it says otherwise! I own nothing!**

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Thalia read **I Accidentally Vaporize****My Pre-Algebra Teacher**

"How can you accidentally vaporize someone?" Leo asked.

The demigods who knew Percy said,

"Ask Percy." At these words Annabeth grew sad but she kept reminding herself that she would see him again soon.

**Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.**

"They never do," Zeus grumbled. All the Olympians looked down sadly because the demigods were agreeing with him.

**If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is:**

"EVERYONE STOP LISTENING!" Thalia screamed. Everyone who knew Percy was nodding their heads and Leo was wondering why. Jason beat him to it though.

"Why should we stop listening?" Jason asked his sister and Leo was silently agreeing with him.

"Because his advice really stinks. We usually leave it to Annabeth." Thalia replied.

"Oh" was his only reply.

**close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.**

"That's not bad seaweed brain but it won't work after a while." Annabeth said. Nobody wanted to point out that she was talking to a book. Athena asked,

"Seaweed Brain?" Clarisse replied,

"Annabeth's nickname for Prissy."

Athena was wondering why her daughter had a nickname for this boy and judging on how Poseidon stiffened when the title was said then _he could be his son_. _The nickname fits but then why is my daughter hanging out with the sea spawns son?_

**Being a half-blood is dangerous.**

"That's the fun part!" Clarisse exclaimed. Ares was silently agreeing with his daughter. The other demigods except for Annabeth scooted away from her. Annabeth was too busy worrying about Percy to notice Clarisse's behavior or the fact that Athena was looking at her curiously.

**It's scary.**

"It's not scary. It's terrifying." Thalia said. Piper was agreeing with her fully.

**Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.**

"That part is awesome!" Ares was now grinning ear to ear until a certain queen of the gods glared at him.

**If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.**

"Why would mortals read this?" Apollo asked.

"They're weird that way." Was what Dionysus replied.

**But if you recognize yourself in these pages—if you feel something stirring inside—stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.**

"Who's they?" Leo asked.

"The monsters duh!" Piper yelled at him while hitting on the head.

"Ouch Beauty Queen!" Leo said. This resulted in another slap on the head.

**Don't say I didn't warn you.**

"You didn't warn me!" the stolls, Hermes, and Apollo sang. This resulted in owls attacking Hermes, Artemis shooting arrows at Apollo, and Thalia shocking the stolls.

"Please continue, Thalia." Athena told her after the girls had their fun.

**My name is Percy Jackson.**

"No its not! Its Prissy." Clarisse exclaimed. This of course brought a whole new round of arguing with the nicknames.

"He's Aqua Dude!" the stolls yelled.

"No he is Kelp Head." Thalia argued.

"No he is Prissy!" Clarisse was saying. The gods were watching this in amusement. After all this was their children. Piper then leaned over to Annabeth. The gods were now paying attention to what Piper would ask Annabeth.

"Annabeth are they always like this?" Piper asked.

"Yeah and it would be even worse if he was here now." Annabeth replied. She grew sad when she said the last part.

"Hold on Piper." Annabeth told her.

"You guys are all wrong!" Annabeth told the demigods who were still arguing about Percy.

"And why is that Annie?" Travis asked.

"First don't call me Annie if you know what's good for you and second, he's a Seaweed Brain."

All the demigods shut up after that for two reasons. One, it wouldn't be wise to argue with Annabeth when it came to Percy after all, she knows him the best out of all of them. Also, they knew that she was semi good about reading these books and they didn't want to ruin it. Thalia decided to let Annabeth win and she said,

"You're right Annabeth now can I read?"

Everyone nodded and Thalia picked the book up and flipped to the right page.

**I'm twelve years old.**

"Wait he was 12 on his first quest?" Jason asked.

"Yeah he was." Annabeth replied.

"That is really young." Jason said. Piper agreed with him. She smiled at him and he smiled back.

"I guess that is young." The stolls muttered. Hearing how old Percy was, Poseidon got really worried for his only son. After all this would all take place next year.

**Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York. Am I a troubled kid?**

"YES!" everyone who had met Percy said.

"What great friends he has," Jason whispered to Piper and Leo. Silently though, he was hoping that back at Camp Jupiter he had people who missed him as much as Percy's friends missed him.

**Yeah. You could say that.**

"Hey he agrees with you!" Hermes said to the demigods.

"Well it is true." Clarisse said.

**I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan— twenty eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff. **

"That sounds great!" Annabeth and Athena said. Poseidon argued,

"No it sounds like torture!"

**I know, it sounds like torture.**

"Percy agrees with you uncle P!" Apollo told him. Artemis said,

"Shut up Apollo and let Thalia read!"

"You know you love me sis." Apollo replied.

"Don't call me sis!"

Thalia took pity on Artemis because Apollo was probably going to say something stupid.

**Most Yancy field trips were.**

**But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.**

**Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee.**

"That sounds like Chiron." Athena said. She looked at Dionysus who replied,

"hmm yeah that's him."

**You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.**

Athena was horrified at the fact that he was sleeping in class while Annabeth was smiling thinking that Percy never changes.

**I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.**

"That'll happen when Mr. D gets our names right!" Thalia said.

"Quiet Taylor and read."

**Boy, was I wrong.**

"See ha!"

"Nobody disagreed with you Thals." Annabeth informed her.

**See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway.**

Everyone was now laughing while the stoll brothers, Leo, Apollo, and Hermes were rolling on the floor clutching their stomachs.

**And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim.**

Everyone was laughing again and Hermes wished that Percy was his son.

**And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.**

"I didn't know Perce did this stuff! We should take him with us for our next prank!" Connor told his brother.

**This trip, I was determined to be good.**

"Like that will happen Seaweed Brain." Annabeth whispered so only Thalia heard. She smiled at her and put an arm around her as well.

**All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.**

"This will be awesome blackmail material!" Travis said. As if on cue a light appeared and in its place was 4 other people.

"Introduce yourselves please!" Zeus yelled at the newcomers.

"I'm Katie Gardner daughter of Demeter." Connor muttered,

"And Travis's girlfriend!" Aphrodite screamed while Travis and Katie were bright red.

"She isn't my girlfriend!" Travis exclaimed. Katie was a little disappointed but she wasn't going to show it.

"I'm Rachael Elizabeth Dare the oracle of Delphi." Apollo was really happy upon hearing this and said,

"My oracle switched bodies! Yeah, but why didn't switch already?" Nobody noticed Hades move a little bit.

"Anyway, I'm Nico di angelo son of Hades and before you say anything Zeus you have two kids and I'm over 70 years old. I was in the Lotus Hotel and Casino. I'm also known as Ghost King."

"I'm Grover Underwood satyr and Lord of the Wild." With everyone introduced Annabeth filled them in on what was happening. Grover said,

"I get to hear what he thinks of me! Cool."

**Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.**

"Thanks Perce." Grover said frowning. Annabeth told him,

"One, you aren't like that anymore and two you could've blown your cover!"

**Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.**

"That really stinks for Prissy" Clarisse said. Annabeth was now griping her knife ready to hurt Nancy badly.

"That ruins all the fun!" guess who said that.

"**I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.**

**Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."**

"Hopefully not with ketchup." Aphrodite told Grover. Grover nodded.

**He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch. "That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.**

"You should've let Percy deck her," the Stoll brothers, Ares, and Clarisse told Grover, while Annabeth said, "Thanks Grover."

"**You're already on Probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."**

Connor asked Grover, "How'd he get on probation?" "I don't know." Grover replied.

"I hit Nancy for insulting you Grover,"

A voice from the shadows said. Everyone jumped when Percy in all his glory was standing there next to a girl and a guy. Percy was wearing jeans and a purple shirt and the other guy who looked like a baby faced Chinese dude was wearing the same thing. The girl who was on the right of Percy had long, dark hair and gold eyes. She was wearing the same thing as the others.

Everyone was shocked. They broke out of it when Annabeth jumped up and screamed, "Percy!" she ran to him and he hugged her back. Thalia was the next one over there and soon, everyone who knew Percy was slapping him on the back and high fiving him.

"Hey guys! This is Frank and Hazel. They are my friends from the Roman camp." He said pointing to his companions. Poseidon looked at his son. _He has grown up fine._ He looked at Percy who was now sitting next to Annabeth and smiled at him. He smiled back. Jason, Piper, and Leo looked at him and introduced themselves. Jason though looked like he was studying him. _He isn't much. I bet I could take him. _Jason had been getting jealouse even though he hid it from everyone ever since he heard about him. Zeus told Percy even though he knew him, "Tell us your name and title!"

Percy rolled his eyes and said, "Perseus 'Percy' Jackson son of Poseidon and Sally Jackson. Hero of Olympus and Praetor of the Twelfth Legion." All the gods looked at him in shock. All of them thinking, why is he the Hero of Olympus? Jason was fuming. _How dare he take my title! _Zeus looked outraged. "Brother you broke the oath!?" "So did you brother." Poseidon replied. Dionysus looking bored said, "can we just read?" Thalia complied.

**Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there.**

"So do we!" Travis and Connor said. Percy noticed a fountain in the corner. He made 2 big hands out of water and made them grab Connor and Travis.

"Perrrccccyyyyy!" Travis and Connor screamed in high pitched voices while everyone else was laughing so hard they had tears in his eyes.

_He is too powerful. If he can do that barely concentrating I don't want to know what he can do without concentrating. He must be killed. _Zeus was thinking. Athena on the other hand was thinking how he must be the one of the Great Prophecy. Jason just wathced in jealousy.

When Travis and Connor were both back in their seats and tried off by Apollo, Thalia started to read again.

**In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.**

"What did you do this time Seaweed Brain?" Annabeth sighed as she kissed him. _How I missed doing this. 8 months is too long away from him… _

"Annabeth explain now!" Athena was fuming. _How dare Barnacle Beard's son kiss my daughter! I should fry him! _Poseidon was having similar thoughts about Annabeth. The couple broke apart shocked that their parents knew. The Poseidon in the future was fine with it but Athena was just warming up to him! They were screwed if their parents didn't approve like they did in the future (or in Athena's case tolerated). The gods were looking at them like they couldn't believe a daughter of Athena and a son of Poseidon were together.

"We can explain," Annabeth said hastily. She was the agreed spokesperson for the couple since Percy was likely to say something he shouldn't.

"Explain then before I set your _boyfriend _on fire!" Athena spat out the word boyfriend like it was a disease.

"As we will read, we were friends since he came to camp. We started dating when he turned sixteen and we've been dating ever since." Annabeth told the gods as a whole.

"Do we approve of this?" Poseidon asked curiously.

"You do Lord Poseidon. Mother is just warming up to him," Annabeth said. Percy was hugging her by now as their chairs became a couch (you can guess that Hermes did it). Aphrodite was just waking up from being unconscious because Ares knocked her out before she could rant and squeal about Percabeth.

"Very well I won't harm him. Please continue reading." Athena told Annabeth and Thalia.

**Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.**

**He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.**

**It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.**

"More than that Prissy," Clarisse told him. _It's nice to see him again. Though I will never tell him._

"I know that!"

**He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.**

**Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.**

**From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. **

"That's Death Breath over here not Kelp Head," Thalia told everyone.

"Hey!" Nico and Percy shouted.

"I only let Wise Girl call me names not you Pinecone Face!" Percy retorted. They just stuck their tongues at each other.

**She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.**

**One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."**

**Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.**

**Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"**

**It came out louder than I meant it to.**

"Of course it did. You are always getting in trouble," Katie and Grover told him.

"I don't always get in trouble!"

"Yes you do!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Do not!"

"Do to!"

"Will you three just shut up already! We get it. Percy you do get in trouble a lot but not all the time. Can we get back to reading now?" Piper screamed using a little charm speak.

**The whole group laughed. Mr. Brunner stopped his story.**

"**Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"**

**My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."**

**Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"**

**I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"**

Travis whispered to the other demigods so the gods wouldn't hear, "That is so weird!"

The gods, the lost hero trio (I'm calling them that for now on if they are mentioned together), and Frank and Hazel looked at them confusedly. The gods because they didn't hear them and the trio because they didn't know that many details. All they knew was that there was a war before Percy disappeared. Frank and Hazel just had no idea what was going on.

"**Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because …"**

"**Well…" I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and-"**

"GOD!" Zeus thundered.

"Brother leave him alone," Poseidon told him sternly.

"**God?" Mr. Brunner asked.**

"**Titan," I corrected myself. "And … he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters-"**

"**Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.**

"**-and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."**

"Nice way to summarize a battle that took ages for the gods to win. It's not like they beat them really easily or anything," Nico said sarcastically.

**Some snickers from the group.**

"What's so funny?" Hera asked.

**Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"**

"**And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"**

"**Busted," Grover muttered.**

"**Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.**

**At least Nancy got packed, too. Mr. Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.**

"I know! Those things have caught us doing so many pranks I lost count!" Travis and Connor wailed.

"I didn't know you could count," Katie told them innocently.

**I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."**

"**I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"**

**The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.**

"All guys are doofuses," Artemis stated. Thalia agreed.

**Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."**

**I knew that was coming.**

**I told Grover to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"**

**Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go- intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.**

"**You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.**

"**About the Titans?"**

"**Oh."**

"**What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."**

**I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.**

"He pushes us all like that Seaweed Brain," Annabeth told her boyfriend who she was leaning against with her head on his chest. _I could stay like this forever._

**I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. **

"That would be cool!" Travis, Connor and Leo said.

"Including the spelling part?" Piper and Katie asked.

"Nevermind."

**But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C- in my life.**

"Annabeth tell me again why you are dating him," Athena asked.

"Because I am mother,"

**No-he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.**

"I hate spelling!" Leo said.

**I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.**

**He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.**

**The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.**

**Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.**

"What are you guys fighting about now?" Demeter asked.

"I don't know but it was probably Zeus' fault," Poseidon replied.

Zeus denied it and said the same thing about Poseidon.

**Nobody else seemed to notice. Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.**

**Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school-the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.**

"**Detention?" Grover asked.**

"**Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean-I'm not a genius."**

"That much we know. I mean if you were a genius, the world would end," Frank told him. Everyone laughed while Frank got soaked.

**Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"**

"Is that how you usually comfort someone?" Hazel asked him.

"No," Grover muttered his face red.

**I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.**

**I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. **

"Momma's boy," Ares and Clarisse muttered only to get soaked by Poseidon and Percy.

**She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.**

"Mamma's boy," Ares and Clarisse muttered again and again they got soaked.

**Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.**

"Cool can I make one? Please!" Leo begged Piper.

"After the Argo II is finished." Piper replied. Hephaestus smiled at Leo.

**I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends-I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists-and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.**

"**Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.**

**I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.**

**I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"**

**Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.**

**Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see-"**

"**-the water-"**

"**-like it grabbed her-"**

"Go fishy powers!" everyone looked at Connor weird.

**I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.**

**As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey-"**

"**I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."**

"Never guess your punishment!" Hermes all but yelled. His sons were nodding along with him.

**That wasn't the right thing to say.**

"You think Perce?" Nico asked.

"**Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.**

"**Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."**

**I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.**

"That was very brave of you Grover," Katie told him.

**She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.**

"**I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.**

"**But-"**

"**You-will-stay-here."**

**Grover looked at me desperately.**

"**It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."**

"**Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now."**

**Nancy Bobofit smirked.**

**I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. **

"You never want to see it. It is really scary! I almost wet my pants when he looked at me!" The twins said.

"I don't think I want to know," the girls muttered.

"I bet mine is better," Ares gloated. Percy looked at him with his stare and everyone watching had to admit that it was scary.

**Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.**

**How'd she get there so fast?**

"She was a monster Percy," Jason told him. _I don't see why he is so special. I defeated a Titan and they are worshiping the ground he walks on. I bet his titles are all fake and he didn't even do any of it. He probably made it all up just for the attention!"_

**I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.**

**I wasn't so sure.**

"Seaweed Brain you should trust your instincts more often," Annabeth told him.

**I went after Mrs. Dodds.**

**Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.**

_I'm going to have a talk with Chiron next time I see him. _Poseidon thought to himself.

**I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.**

**Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.**

**But apparently that wasn't the plan.**

"Of course it isn't Kelp Head," Thalia shocked him.

"What was that for?" Percy whined.

"For being stupid," Thalia retorted.

"He can't help it," Hazel said. Percy pouted at them.

**I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.**

**Except for us, the gallery was empty.**

"Great just Great," Poseidon was saying.

**Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.**

Annabeth and Poseidon went pale even though he was there with them.

**Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it…**

"**You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.**

**I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."**

**She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"**

"With what?" the gods asked. The demigods that knew made a zipping sound with their lips.

**The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.**

**She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.**

_He really is stupid. Look at my friends being worried for him! For him! I mean they are supposed to be mine not his! I was supposed to become leader of Camp Half-Blood like he did for Camp Jupiter. Go to Hades Jackson before I send you there! _Jason was thinking jealously seeing his friends worried for Percy.

**Thunder shook the building.**

"**We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."**

**I didn't know what she was talking about.**

"Neither do we," the gods complained. Hades who was figuring out who Mrs. Dodds was, started scooting his throne away from his.

**All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.**

"You have to come pranking with us someday!" the Twins told Percy.

"**Well?" she demanded.**

"**Ma'am, I don't…"**

"**Your time is up," she hissed.**

**Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.**

"HADES!" Poseidon roared. You could feel the throne room shake. Everyone sat completely still trying not to get hurt. The earthquake suddenly stopped. They looked at Poseidon who just looked confused. They turned to see Percy sitting on the couch with his eyes closed. He opened them and they radiated power. Poseidon forgot what he was angry about and everyone looked at him in awe or in Jason's case, jealousy.

_He can't be that powerful! I am the son of Jupiter not him! He should be bowing to me not the other way around._

**Then things got even stranger.**

**Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.**

"**What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.**

**Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.**

Poseidon remembered why he was angry and lunged at Hades. The gods couldn't do anything to help for Poseidon had caused another quake. Percy stood up and he glowed green. He stopped the earthquake and used water that seemed to appear out of thin air and held the two apart from each other.

"Dad please stop it. You know I'm here and I know you're angry but please stop it. You are doing more harm than good. Please let go of Uncle Hades and sit back down," Percy said calmly.

Poseidon smiled at him and nodded. He sat down in his thrown after throwing a glare at Hades. Hades shot Percy a grateful smile.

_He is very powerful. _Were the thoughts running through the gods heads. Poseidon was just proud of his son. _He is very handsome and brave._ Was what Piper was thinking wishing she had a chance with him. _That's our Perc. _Was the demigods who knew Percy thought. _Oh what am I going to do with you Seaweed Brain? _Annabeth thought. _He is so awesome! I want his autograph. _Leo of course thought this. Jason was just silently fuming.

**With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword-Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.**

**Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.**

**My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.**

"Wimp," Ares said. He got soaked by Poseidon. _Prissy is not a wimp but I'm never going to tell him that._ Clarisse was thinking. Of course, she wasn't going to say anything out loud.

**She snarled, "Die, honey!"**

**And she flew straight at me.**

**Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.**

"Percy this may sound weird but how is that natural?" Rachel and Hazel asked. Rachel had just woken up from a nap and she only heard that part of the book. Hazel quickly filled her in.

**The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!**

**Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan.**

"What is it with you and water?" Thalia and Nico asked.

**She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.**

"That's not creepy at all," Leo joked.

**I was alone.**

**There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.**

_Ha! The mist is still affecting him! He is such a wimp. He must of made up all of those stories that are told back at Camp Half-Blood._ Jason thought with menace.

**Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.**

**My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.**

**Had I imagined the whole thing?**

"Nope, you didn't Percy," Hazel and Frank told him. _Look he is even taking over Camp Jupiter even though they should hate each other._ Jason scowled while Percy pouted at them. Piper noticing the scowl, and asked him what was wrong. He just muttered nothing. _What's up with him. Ever since he heard about Percy he has been acting strange. It's as if he's jealous._

**I went back outside.**

**It had started to rain.**

**Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."**

"Who?" Apollo asked.

**I said, "Who?"**

"**Our teacher. Duh!"**

**I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.**

**She just rolled her eyes and turned away.**

**I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.**

**He said, "Who?"**

**But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.**

"Grover you need to learn how to lie," Hermes said. You could hear the Stolls whispering about lessons.

"**Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."**

**Thunder boomed overhead.**

"What has you cranky father?" Jason asked. He ignored him. _So he won't talk to me but he will talk to Percy!? _Jason thought as Zeus asked Percy the same question. Zeus didn't get an answer but he wasn't annoyed.

**I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.**

**I went over to him.**

**He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."**

**I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.**

"**Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"**

**He stared at me blankly. "Who?"**

"**The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."**

**He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at Yancy Academy. Are you feeling all right?"**

"Now Chiron knows how to lie!" the pranksters in the room exclaimed. "So who wants to read next?" Thalia said holding up the book.

"I will," Percy said. "Chapter 2 **Three Old Ladies Knit the Socks of Death…"**


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: I own nothing! For all readers I will try and post at least once a week but I'm busy with school and everything so it might take longer for some chapters to be written! Also, thanks for the reviews! I'll take your suggestions and add them into the next chapter or so!

* * *

**I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. **

"Of course your Percy Jackson!" Nico exclaimed as though it was obvious.

**This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. **

"Do bad we didn't think of that! Imagine if Perc came back from a quest and we went around acting like we didn't know what he was talking about," Connor told Travis. Travis nodded along with him absently. He was thinking about how cute Katie looked.

"Then again it's really easy to not get what Kelp Head was saying," Thalia said joking. Percy stuck his tongue out at her. _Anything that would show everyone how much of a fool Jackson is. _Jason was thinking sourly.

**The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr-a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip-had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.**

**Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.**

"You are psycho Percy, just face it," Rachel told him. Percy protested weakly to it knowing that he did some really crazy stuff. Frank and Hazel looked at him thinking, _what did he do?!_

**It got so I almost believed them-Mrs. Dodds had never existed.**

**Almost.**

"Grover!" Annabeth groaned. _I missed this. Being able to joke around with everyone and not have to worry about the world ending._ Annabeth smiled. Percy looked down at her fondly.

**But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying.**

"Boys after this reading is done, you need to really give him lessons," Hermes told his kids. They nodded furiously.

**Something was going on. Something had happened at the museum.**

"No duh Prissy!"

**I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.**

Piper gave him a sympathetic look. Jason watched in jealousy.

**The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. **

"I demand to know why we are fighting Perseus!" Zeus glared at him. Jason smirked. Percy ignored him and got Zeus very angry. Before anyone could react, Zeus used his master bolt and shot a bolt at Percy. Annabeth screamed and got pushed out of the way. Poseidon stood up with his trident in hand ready to shout at Zeus. Before he could though, he was yet again restrained by water. Everyone looked in awe to see Percy standing there calmly as though nothing happened. He was glowing again.

"Bu… how… di..di..di…did yo…" Zeus sputtered. "How did I do that?" Percy clarified. Zeus and the rest of the gods nodded dumbly.

"I put up a water shield around myself. It is of course invisible. Athena it is like that because I used the water in the air that you can't see." Percy answered Athena's unasked question. Poseidon beamed at him and Hades could care less. _He has yet to harm Zeus so why should he harm me when I haven't even talked to him yet. _

Jason of course was completely different. _How can he be more powerful than father and me! He must be lying, yah that's it he was lying! Some god helped him because he bribed them. I will prove it to the world that he is lying scum! I mean, he can't be more powerful than I! I defeated a Titan and what did he do? He made up some far-fetched tale about his "Achievements". Pathetic!_

Percy sat down taking Annabeth and having her in the same position as earlier. Leo of course just wanted his autograph even more. Piper and Aphrodite wanted him to be theirs even more but they knew that they couldn't have him. Piper might not like it, but she is a daughter of Aphrodite. When it comes to love and boys though she might not be as obsessed, but she has a soft spot for them. They both recognized true love when they saw it. Hazel and Frank were in awe of their friend. _How powerful is he really. Was that hurricane just a small show of power from him?_

The others of camp Half-Blood realized that he was holding out on them. Thalia and Nico were both glad that he didn't use his full power when they fought each other. Rachel smiled a creepy I know all smile.

**One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.**

**I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from Ds to Fs. **

"Way to go Percy!" Apollo, Hermes, and his kids cheered.

**I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.**

They cheered again.

**Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.**

Everyone was laughing so hard that they had tears in their eyes. Even Athena and Hades had to chuckle. Everyone stared at them. They looked back. _These books might patch things up between our family. _Hestia thought happily. Percy saw her and smiled. She smile warmly at him back.

**The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to Yancy Academy.**

**Fine, I told myself. Just fine.**

**I was homesick.**

Ares and Clarisse didn't say anything for fear of getting soaked but they thought it.

**I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.**

"What happened to Paul?" Nico asked. "Paul?" Poseidon answered. "Paul is my second step father dad and Nico Paul was after this."

**And yet… there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. **

"Hey!" Grover scowled.

**I worried how he'd survive next year without me.**

**I'd miss Latin class, too-Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.**

**As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. **

"Don't go into the light!" Leo screamed. Everyone looked at him strangely.

**I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.**

**The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology across my dorm room. **

Athena looked appalled and Annabeth slapped Percy upside the head.

**Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. **

"I can do that now," Percy said without thinking. "You WHAT!" Poseidon exclaimed. "How do you know now?" Poseidon asked dreading the answer. "Spoilers," Percy answered.

**And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.**

"I can do that well now too!" "We know Percy we watched you remember?" Hazel told him as though he was 5.

**I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.**

Hermes got a glint in his eyes.

**I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.**

**I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.**

**I'd never asked a teacher for help before. **

"Maybe that's why you do bad," Athena said.

**Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.**

"You want to impress Chiron?" Piper asked innocently. Percy just muttered nonsense.

**I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor.**

Poseidon, Grover, Annabeth, and everyone that knew him well groaned.

**I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said "… worried about Percy, sir."**

Grover turned red as Annabeth glared at him.

**I froze.**

**I'm not usually an eavesdropper, but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult.**

"You have a point there Percy. Maybe I'll let the Stolls go next time." Katie said brightly. "Just kidding," she told the Stolls seeing their hopeful look.

**I inched closer.**

"… **alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too-"**

"**We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."**

"That still hasn't happened!" Thalia said. She got soaked. She glared at him and he glared back twice as hard. She backed down slightly fearful. Percy shot Annabeth a smug look. She rolled her eyes at him.

"**But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline- "**

"I want to know the deadline!" Zeus said. He was ignored though the gods and demigods that didn't know it were curious too.

"**Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."**

"**Sir, he saw her… ."**

"**His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."**

"**Sir, I … I can't fail in my duties again." Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."**

"Stop blaming yourself!" Thalia yelled at him. Grover nodded not believing it. Percy looked at him. He gave a look that said _we are going to talk later. _He nodded to him and swallowed.

"**You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall-"**

**The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.**

Apollo, Hermes, and his children groaned.

**Mr. Brunner went silent.**

**My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.**

They sighed. At least he took the evidence.

**A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.**

Artemis looked disapproving.

**I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.**

**A few seconds later I heard a slow clop-clop-clop, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, then moved on.**

Poseidon sighed in relief.

**A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.**

**Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."**

"What happened?" Zeus was getting tired of the not answering.

"**Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn …"**

"**Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."**

"**Don't remind me."**

**The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.**

**I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.**

**Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.**

**Grover was lying on his bed, studying his Latin exam notes like he'd been there all night.**

"**Hey," he said, bleary-eyed. "You going to be ready for this test?"**

**I didn't answer.**

"**You look awful." He frowned. "Is everything okay?"**

"**Just… tired."**

**I turned so he couldn't read my expression, and started getting ready for bed.**

"You know they can read emotions right?" Jason asked him. "Yes I do. He could blame my nervousness on the tests that we were taking the next day," Percy replied back at him friendly. Grover frowned when he felt jealousy and hate coming off Jason.

**I didn't understand what I'd heard downstairs. I wanted to believe I'd imagined the whole thing.**

**But one thing was clear: Grover and Mr. Brunner were talking about me behind my back. They thought I was in some kind of danger.**

"You always are Seaweed Brain," Annabeth sighed and shook her head fondly. He smiled and kissed her.

**The next afternoon, as I was leaving the three-hour Latin exam, my eyes swimming with all the Greek and Roman names I'd misspelled, Mr. Brunner called me back inside.**

**For a moment, I was worried he'd found out about my eavesdropping the night before, but that didn't seem to be the problem.**

"**Percy," he said. "Don't be discouraged about leaving Yancy. It's … it's for the best."**

**His tone was kind, but the words still embarrassed me. Even though he was speaking quietly, the other kids finishing the test could hear. Nancy Bobofit smirked at me and made sarcastic little kissing motions with her lips.**

Annabeth grabbed the hilt of her knife.

**I mumbled, "Okay, sir."**

"**I mean …" Mr. Brunner wheeled his chair back and forth, like he wasn't sure what to say. "This isn't the right place for you. It was only a matter of time."**

"He's not good at this though is he?" Hestia smiled at him sympathetically. Most people jumped not remembering that she was there. The only people who didn't jump were Hades, Nico, Poseidon, and Percy.

**My eyes stung.**

Ares couldn't resist. "Crybaby." He got soaked with half the Pacific Ocean.

**Here was my favorite teacher, in front of the class, telling me I couldn't handle it. After saying he believed in me all year, now he was telling me I was destined to get kicked out.**

"**Right," I said, trembling.**

"**No, no," Mr. Brunner said. "Oh, confound it all. What I'm trying to say … you're not normal, Percy. That's nothing to be-"**

"**Thanks," I blurted. "Thanks a lot, sir, for reminding me.**

"Harsh," Hazel and Katie said. They smiled at each other. Jason was laughing internally.

"**Percy-"**

**But I was already gone.**

**On the last day of the term, I shoved my clothes into my suitcase.**

**The other guys were joking around, talking about their vacation plans. One of them was going on a hiking trip to Switzerland. Another was cruising the Caribbean for a month. They were juvenile delinquents, like me, but they were rich juvenile delinquents. Their daddies were executives, or ambassadors, or celebrities. I was a nobody, from a family of nobodies.**

"Maybe his father but not his uncle!" Zeus said. Percy smiled at his dad sheepishly and Poseidon smile back saying all was forgiven.

**They asked me what I'd be doing this summer and I told them I was going back to the city.**

**What I didn't tell them was that I'd have to get a summer job walking dogs or selling magazine subscriptions, and spend my free time worrying about where I'd go to school in the fall.**

"**Oh," one of the guys said. "That's cool."**

**They went back to their conversation as if I'd never existed.**

Demeter huffed.

**The only person I dreaded saying good-bye to was Grover, but as it turned out, I didn't have to. He'd booked a ticket to Manhattan on the same Greyhound as I had, so there we were, together again, heading into the city.**

"Stalker!" the Stolls and Leo yelled.

**During the whole bus ride, Grover kept glancing nervously down the aisle, watching the other passengers. It occurred to me that he'd always acted nervous and fidgety when we left Yancy, as if he expected something bad to happen. Before, I'd always assumed he was worried about getting teased. But there was nobody to tease him on the Greyhound.**

**Finally I couldn't stand it anymore.**

**I said, "Looking for Kindly Ones?"**

"Nice one Perc!"

**Grover nearly jumped out of his seat. "Wha-what do you mean?"**

**I confessed about eavesdropping on him and Mr. Brunner the night before the exam.**

**Grover's eye twitched. "How much did you hear?"**

"**Oh … not much. What's the summer solstice dead-line?"**

"Not much, just the whole conversation," Grover muttered.

**He winced. "Look, Percy … I was just worried for you, see? I mean, hallucinating about demon math teachers …"**

"**Grover-"**

"**And I was telling Mr. Brunner that maybe you were overstressed or something, because there was no such person as Mrs. Dodds, and …"**

"Grover, you're a really, really bad liar," Thalia said.

"**Grover, you're a really, really bad liar."**

Thalia scowled while the Stolls were laughing. "You have PJS!" Nico screamed at her.

"What is PJS? I need to know if there are any patients that have it," Apollo asked him.

"It stands for Percy Jackson Syndrome. You have it when you start thinking, talking, and acting like Percy," Nico answered. Jason was seething with jealousy. _He gets a disease made up after him and not me! _

Percy scowled at them.

**His ears turned pink.**

"Like they are now," Thalia teased.

**From his shirt pocket, he fished out a grubby business card. "Just take this, okay? In case you need me this summer.**

**The card was in fancy script, which was murder on my dyslexic eyes,**

"Why do you do that?" Demeter asked Dionysus. "It's funny to watch them try and make it out."

**but I finally made out something like:**

**Grover Underwood**

**Keeper**

**Half-Blood Hill**

**Long Island, New York**

**(800) 009-0009**

"**What's Half-"**

"**Don't say it aloud!" he yelped. "That's my, um … summer address."**

**My heart sank. Grover had a summer home. I'd never considered that his family might be as rich as the others at Yancy.**

"I don't think Camp Half-Blood qualifies as rich Percy," Rachel told him. Percy smiled sheepishly from his spot on the couch. Annabeth just looked up at him and shook her head.

_They're soooooo cute together! _Aphrodite was thinking. Even Athena was smiling slightly at the scene.

"**Okay," I said glumly. "So, like, if I want to come visit your mansion."**

"I don't think the Big House is a mansion Seaweed Brain," Annabeth said to him fondly.

"I didn't know that!" Percy retorted kissing her cheek.

**He nodded. "Or … or if you need me."**

"**Why would I need you?"**

Annabeth slapped him. "Sorry Grover," Percy told him. Grover smiled an it's ok smile.

**It came out harsher than I meant it to.**

**Grover blushed right down to his Adam's apple. "Look, Percy, the truth is, I-I kind of have to protect you."**

**I stared at him.**

**All year long, I'd gotten in fights, keeping bullies away from him. I'd lost sleep worrying that he'd get beaten up next year without me.**

"You did that?!" Grover asked him. Percy nodded and smiled at him.

**And here he was acting like he was the one who defended me.**

"**Grover," I said, "what exactly are you protecting me from?"**

"Oh nothing really just Hades and some of his minions," Leo said tactlessly.

"What!" Poseidon exclaimed. Percy was quick to reassure him.

**There was a huge grinding noise under our feet. Black smoke poured from the dashboard and the whole bus filled with a smell like rotten eggs. The driver cursed and limped the Greyhound over to the side of the highway.**

**After a few minutes clanking around in the engine compartment, the driver announced that we'd all have to get off. Grover and I filed outside with everybody else.**

**We were on a stretch of country road-no place you'd notice if you didn't break down there. On our side of the highway was nothing but maple trees and litter from passing cars. On the other side, across four lanes of asphalt shimmering with afternoon heat, was an old-fashioned fruit stand.**

"Fruit!" Demeter yelled. "Quick! Read before she goes on about cereal!" Hades yelled at Percy.

"Cereal…" Demeter muttered dreamly.

**The stuff on sale looked really good: heaping boxes of bloodred cherries and apples, walnuts and apricots, jugs of cider in a claw-foot tub full of ice. There were no customers, just three old ladies sitting in rocking chairs in the shade of a maple tree, knitting the biggest pair of socks I'd ever seen.**

Athena and Annabeth gasped, figuring out who they were. Annabeth stood up so fast, you would've missed her if you had blinked.

"Why didn't you tell me!" She accused Percy and Grover. Percy and Grover were speechless and afraid of her.

"Calm down Wise Girl. We didn't want to worry you. Besides, I'm here and alive so it's ok really. Just let go of your dagger and sit back down," Percy reassured smiling his lopsided smile that made all the women in the room swoon even if they were eternal maidens. She did exactly what he asked only holding on to Percy as if to reassure herself that he was alive.

Even Athena was baffled at how well he could calm her down. Jason was drowning in jealousy. _I should be able to make girls swoon and listen to me like that. I'm the son of the most powerful god out there making me the most powerful demigod out there. It's not fair!_

**I mean these socks were the size of sweaters, but they were clearly socks. The lady on the right knitted one of them. The lady on the left knitted the other. The lady in the middle held an enormous basket of electric-blue yarn.**

**All three women looked ancient, with pale faces wrinkled like fruit leather, silver hair tied back in white bandannas, bony arms sticking out of bleached cotton dresses.**

**The weirdest thing was, they seemed to be looking right at me.**

"No no no no no no no…" Poseidon was muttering. Percy got up, hugged and smiled at him, and sat back down after making sure he was ok.

**I looked over at Grover to say something about this and saw that the blood had drained from his face. His nose was twitching.**

"**Grover?" I said. "Hey, man-"**

"**Tell me they're not looking at you. They are, aren't they?"**

"**Yeah. Weird, huh? You think those socks would fit me?"**

Annabeth slapped him.

"**Not funny, Percy. Not funny at all."**

**The old lady in the middle took out a huge pair of scissors-gold and silver, long-bladed, like shears. I heard Grover catch his breath.**

"If you weren't here son, I would've passed out by now," Poseidon told him with a smile. Percy smiled back. All of the demigods and gods with kids were slightly jealous. _They have a great relationship._

"**We're getting on the bus," he told me. "Come on."**

"**What?" I said. "It's a thousand degrees in there."**

"**Come on!'" He pried open the door and climbed inside, but I stayed back.**

Annabeth and Poseidon groaned.

**Across the road, the old ladies were still watching me. The middle one cut the yarn, and I swear I could hear that snip across four lanes of traffic. **

Annabeth and Poseidon hissed and looked at Percy respectively, making sure he was really there.

**Her two friends balled up the electric-blue socks, leaving me wondering who they could possibly be for-Sasquatch or Godzilla.**

Everyone was laughing or chuckling at that point. The tension that had been building up dissolved completely. Hestia smiled._ Perseus is good at defusing the tension. These books were a great idea. Our family is already closer together than ever._

**At the rear of the bus, the driver wrenched a big chunk of smoking metal out of the engine compartment. The bus shuddered, and the engine roared back to life.**

**The passengers cheered.**

"**Darn right!" yelled the driver. He slapped the bus with his hat. "Everybody back on board!"**

**Once we got going, I started feeling feverish, as if I'd caught the flu.**

Annabeth and Poseidon paled again.

**Grover didn't look much better. He was shivering and his teeth were chattering.**

"**Grover?"**

"**Yeah?"**

"**What are you not telling me?"**

"A lot," Artemis muttered to herself.

**He dabbed his forehead with his shirt sleeve. "Percy, what did you see back at the fruit stand?"**

"**You mean the old ladies? What is it about them, man? They're not like … Mrs. Dodds, are they?"**

"Much older Perseus," Hestia told him with a warm smile. He smiled back and waved.

**His expression was hard to read, but I got the feeling that the fruit-stand ladies were something much, much worse than Mrs. Dodds. He said, "Just tell me what you saw."**

"**The middle one took out her scissors, and she cut the yarn."**

**He closed his eyes and made a gesture with his fingers that might've been crossing himself, but it wasn't. It was something else, something almost-older.**

"You have good instincts," Hera said.

**He said, "You saw her snip the cord."**

"**Yeah. So?" But even as I said it, I knew it was a big deal.**

"No meeting the fates isn't a big deal at all," Nico said sarcastically. Annabeth's dagger was suddenly next to his head stuck in his chair. She got up and took it back while slapping Nico in the process.

"**This is not happening," Grover mumbled. He started chewing at his thumb. "I don't want this to be like the last time."**

"**What last time?"**

"**Always sixth grade. They never get past sixth."**

"Goat Boy you are really creepy," Thalia said.

"**Grover," I said, because he was really starting to scare me. "What are you talking about?"**

"**Let me walk you home from the bus station. Promise me."**

**This seemed like a strange request to me, but I promised he could.**

"Some promise that was!" Grover muttered. Percy just grinned.

"**Is this like a superstition or something?" I asked.**

**No answer.**

"**Grover-that snipping of the yarn. Does that mean somebody is going to die?"**

_Very good instincts. _Artemis thought. Athena and Hestia were thinking the same thing.

**He looked at me mournfully, like he was already picking the kind of flowers I'd like best on my coffin.**

"So that's it!" Percy said cheerfully snapping the book shut. "Who wants to read next?" Percy asked.

"How about lunch first?" Demeter said. Everyone cheered.

"Ok everyone follow me!" Hermes screamed like a child on a sugar high. Everyone walked or flashed to go get lunch.


	4. Chapter 4

**AN: Sorry for not posting sooner but with school and everything I'm very busy. During winter break I should be able to post more. I DON'T OWN ANYTHING!**

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After lunch Annabeth picked the book up and sat on Percy's lap. She was about to read when a bright light filled the room along with a note.

4 people appeared once the light disappeared. The gods gasped. They knew who they looked like after all, they were heroes. Only, they were around a couple million years ago. Annabeth, after the gods gasped, made the connection. She also gasped and this made Percy and the other demigods look at her weirdly. She mouthed unable to form noise from her mouth, the heroes old. As for the heroes of old, they were to put it lightly, scared and shocked. They looked at each other and at everyone else in the room, and back to themselves again. The note had just appeared in front of Percy and he picked it up. He cleared his throat but got no response. He did it again but still there was no response. He was getting irritated.

_Will everyone just pay attention!? Hmmmm maybe if…_ Percy was thinking the extreme. He knew that he would probably get fried by Zeus but hey a guy's got to do what a guy's got to do. Everyone was brought out of their shock when a 5.0 magnitude earthquake shook them out of their shock. Everyone, including the heroes of old, looked at Poseidon. When he shook his head the gods and demigods (I'm going to call the kids from the future demigods and the people from the past, the heroes of old) looked at Percy who was looking at them with a look that said it's about time. The heroes of old looked at this demigod curiously. Who was he to have the powers of Poseidon that even the children of Poseidon that they know can't do? Percy then said, "I have a note if you would like to know what's going on everyone." Ares and Zeus glared at him while Athena gestured him to read it.

_Dear gods, demigods, and the heroes of old,_

_We have decided to make things more interesting. These four heroes are from Ancient Greece to read about their cousin or brother. They will introduce themselves and then you can continue reading._

_Sincerely, _

_The Fates_

After Percy was finished the note the four heroes looked at each other. It seemed that to them, they were famous. One guy, about 5'9" with brown hair and emerald green eyes stepped forward.

"I'm Theseus son of Poseidon. King of Athens," Theseus said. Poseidon smiled at him.

"YES!" Percy jumped up and down in joy. "Sit down Seaweed Brain!" Annabeth told him.

Theseus looked at him. "Ohhhh, hi I'm your little brother, Perseus "Percy" Jackson son of Poseidon and Sally Jackson." Percy told Theseus. Theseus looked at him, smiled, looked at Poseidon and back at Percy. "Cool! I'm a big brother!" Theseus exclaimed.

Shaking his head, another guy stepped up. He was 5'11" with red orange hair and forest green eyes. "I'm Orion son of Poseidon." Percy did another little dance in his seat. Orion looked at Poseidon and Percy and smiled at them.

The third guy stepped up as well. He was 5'10" with sandy blond hair and sky blue eyes. "I'm Perseus the original son of Zeus," Perseus (I'm going to call future Percy, Percy and past Percy Perseus) smiled a warm smile and said. Thalia and Jason introduced themselves with Jason thinking _someone else to say that Percy is a jerk._

The last guy who stepped up was 6'5" with really buff muscles and brown hair with dark blue eyes. "I'm Hercules son of Zeus," Hercules said smugly. Jason was silently cheering. _All the sons of Zeus against the son of Poseidon! _Everyone introduced themselves and explained to the heroes of old about what they were doing before they got there. Jason and Hercules sighed mentally. _Here we go again_ Jason thought. _We shouldn't read about this stuck up son of Poseidon, we should be reading about me!_ Hercules thought to himself.

"Sooo who's reading next?" Athena asked.

"I will," Apollo said. Apollo read, "Chapter 3 **Grover unexpectedly loses his pants**..."


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: I own nothing and I'm not the best at spelling and grammar so give me a break! Break's coming up so I'll try and write more but hey, I'm more of a reader not a writer!**

* * *

"I will," Annabeth said. Annabeth read, "Chapter 3 **Grover unexpectedly loses his pants**..."

"Hold on for a sec Wise Girl," Percy told her. She gave him a confused look.

Percy turned to Hercules. "So you are the Hercules from the twelve labors right?" Hercules nodded smugly. Percy got up, took out _Riptide _and charged. The demigods from Camp Half Blood cheered him on knowing what he did to Zoe. Artemis looked happy. The other gods and demigods looked confused. _Why try and attack? _Was going through their heads.

Percy reached him and swung. Hercules just barely dodged the attack. Percy just started slashing and jabbing a perfect combination of Greek and Roman techniques. Percy moved so fast that he looked like a blur on motion trying to kill someone. You could see Percy's aura. It was a sea green and it looked as though it would change colors by the fact that it was flashing in and out of blue.

Hercules was getting tired and he was only dodging. Percy was just getting started. Everyone else was amazed by Percy and his powers. Annabeth thought that although she would love for Zoe to have revenge, it wasn't the time.

"Seaweed Brain come on! I know your angry about what he did and so am I but you need to calm down before you cause another earthquake!" Annabeth screamed at Percy.

Percy stopped the attack. Hercules looked tired and worn. If it was anyone other than Hercules, they would be dead. He walked calmly over to Annabeth, picked her up, sat her on his lap, and kissed her on the mouth shortly but sweetly. Hercules catching his breath glared at the son of Poseidon.

As for Poseidon he was filled with a deep pride for his son. The others were shocked, that they didn't snap out of it until Annabeth started reading again.

**Confession time: I ditched Grover as soon as we got to the bus terminal.**

"That doesn't seem like you Perc. You always keep the promises you make," Nico said.

_Yeah right. _Jason and Hercules said.

**I know, I know. It was rude. But Grover was freaking me out, looking at me like I was a dead man, muttering "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to be sixth grade?"**

Thalia sighed. "I would probably do that too."

**Whenever he got upset, Grover's bladder acted up, so I wasn't surprised when, as soon as we got off the bus, he made me promise to wait for him, then made a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I got my suitcase, slipped outside, and caught the first taxi uptown.**

"**East One-hundred-and-fourth and First," I told the driver.**

"We know where you live! We know where you live!" the Stolls chanted. Percy told them, "I don't live there anymore."

**A word about my mother, before you meet her.**

"She is amazing!" Poseidon and Percy said at the same time. Everyone who had ever met her agreed. Theseus and Orion were talking with each other about their brother.

"Hey did anyone else notice that Percy looks more like dad than Orion and I?" Theseus asked. Everyone looked from Percy to Poseidon and back again. Everyone seemed to agree. Athena was thinking hard. _Maybe he looks just like fish face because he has the most powers._

**Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world, which just proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. Her own parents died in a plane crash when she was five, and she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for a college with a good creative-writing program. Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma.**

"I feel bad for her," Hestia said. Everyone but the inconsiderate *cough* Ares *cough* nodded.

**The only good break she ever got was meeting my dad.**

Aphrodite's squeal was so loud that many people's eardrums were ringing.

**I don't have any memories of him, just this sort of warm glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile. My mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad. She has no pictures.**

**See, they weren't married. She told me he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret. Then one day, he set sail across the Atlantic on some important journey, and he never came back.**

**Lost at sea, my mom told me. Not dead. Lost at sea.**

"She didn't lie yet she did. I like her!" Hermes exclaimed.

**She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high school diploma, and raised me on her own. She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid.**

Annabeth, Thalia, and Nico snorted. This of course, caused Percy to pout and everyone to laugh. Perseus looked at the person who was named after him and he started thinking _he doesn't seem too bad._

**Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano,**

The room start shaking once this was read. The heroes of old and the gods looked at Poseidon while the demigods looked at Percy who looked so livid that they didn't do anything. Poseidon shook his head no, so the gods looked at Percy while the heroes of old were confused. When they saw the gods looking at Percy so they turned to him as well. What they saw was a furious son of Poseidon and a daughter of Athena trying to calm him down. Theseus and Orion just stared in awe and pride when they saw that their little brother did that. They also were a little jealous but only because they couldn't do anything like that.

Perseus was astounded. _The guy named after me is definitely powerful. I wonder what will happen in these books._

_He did not do that! He is making this up. Poseidon must have done it but let Percy take the credit. I defeated a titan and I'm the son of Zeus! I should have that kind of power. If I don't have it, than that scum of Poseidon shouldn't! _Jason thought seething silently.

Hercules thought along the same lines except his were simpler. _I'm Hercules! I am the most powerful demigod ever! He is not more powerful than me because I am Hercules._

By this time, Annabeth had calmed Percy down. "I'm sorry for the earthquake but you'll find out why I did it by the end of this book," Percy told everyone.

**who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world-class jerk. When I was young, I nicknamed him Smelly Gabe. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts.**

Everyone looked green.

**Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along … well, when I came home is a good example.**

**I walked into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe was in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blared ESPN. Chips and beer cans were strewn all over the carpet.**

"Ewwwwwwwww!" Aphrodite screamed. Everyone agreed.

**Hardly looking up, he said around his cigar, "So, you're home."**

"**Where's my mom?"**

"**Working," he said. "You got any cash?"**

"What no welcome back or how have you been this last 6 months?" Rachel and Katie asked.

**That was it. No Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months?**

"You have PJS! Noooo it's spreading!" the Stolls and Leo exclaimed. Needless to say, they got slapped.

**Gabe had put on weight. He looked like a tuskless walrus in thrift-store clothes. He had about three hairs on his head, all combed over his bald scalp, as if that made him handsome or something.**

"Pigs would be more handsome than him!" Demeter said. Hera nodded.

**He managed the Electronics Mega-Mart in Queens, but he stayed home most of the time. I don't know why he hadn't been fired long before. He just kept on collecting paychecks, spending the money on cigars that made me nauseous, and on beer, of course. Always beer. Whenever I was home, he expected me to provide his gambling funds. He called that our "guy secret." Meaning, if I told my mom, he would punch my lights out.**

"**I don't have any cash," I told him.**

**He raised a greasy eyebrow.**

The girls looked sick.

**Gabe could sniff out money like a bloodhound, which was surprising, since his own smell should've covered up everything else.**

_No she didn't did she?_ Athena thought astonished. _If she did she would have my complete respect._

"**You took a taxi from the bus station," he said. Probably paid with a twenty. Got six, seven bucks in change. Somebody expects to live under this roof, he ought to carry his own weight. Am I right, Eddie?"**

**Eddie, the super of the apartment building, looked at me with a twinge of sympathy. "Come on, Gabe," he said. "The kid just got here."**

"At least one of them is semi-decent," Hestia said.

"**Am I right?" Gabe repeated.**

**Eddie scowled into his bowl of pretzels. The other two guys passed gas in harmony.**

Aphrodite fainted out of disgust.

"**Fine," I said. I dug a wad of dollars out of my pocket and threw the money on the table. "I hope you lose."**

"I'll make sure of it," Dionysus and Hermes told the book venomously.

"**Your report card came, brain boy!" he shouted after me. "I wouldn't act so snooty!"**

**I slammed the door to my room, which really wasn't my room. During school months, it was Gabe's "study." He didn't study anything in there except old car magazines, but he loved shoving my stuff in the closet, leaving his muddy boots on my windowsill, and doing his best to make the place smell like his nasty cologne and cigars and stale beer.**

**I dropped my suitcase on the bed. Home sweet home.**

"Oh how I love your sarcasm Perc," Nico told Percy.

**Gabe's smell was almost worse than the nightmares about Mrs. Dodds, or the sound of that old fruit lady's shears snipping the yarn.**

**But as soon as I thought that, my legs felt weak. I remembered Grover's look of panic-how he'd made me promise I wouldn't go home without him. A sudden chill rolled through me. I felt like someone-something-was looking for me right now, maybe pounding its way up the stairs, growing long, horrible talons.**

Poseidon was hyperventilating after all this was read. The older sons of Poseidon looked worried and Annabeth kissed Percy just to make sure he was there.

**Then I heard my mom's voice. "Percy?"**

Said People from before breathed a sigh of relief.

**She opened the bedroom door, and my fears melted.**

**My mother can make me feel good just by walking into the room. Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad. I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Gabe.**

"She must be a miracle worker than," Hazel said.

"**Oh, Percy." She hugged me tight. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas!"**

**Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central. She'd brought me a huge bag of "free samples," the way she always did when I came home.**

Apollo, Hermes, Hermes' sons, and Leo drooled.

**We sat together on the edge of the bed. While I attacked the blueberry sour strings, she ran her hand through my hair and demanded to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She didn't mention anything about my getting expelled. She didn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right?**

**I told her she was smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her.**

**From the other room, Gabe yelled, "Hey, Sally-how about some bean dip, huh?"**

**I gritted my teeth.**

**My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire, not to some jerk like Gabe.**

**For her sake, I tried to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I told her I wasn't too down about the expulsion. I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends. I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as bad as the headmaster said. I liked Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convinced myself. I started choking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner. Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly didn't seem so bad.**

**Until that trip to the museum …**

"**What?" my mom asked. Her eyes tugged at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?"**

"**No, Mom."**

**I felt bad lying. I wanted to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I thought it would sound stupid.**

"No it wouldn't son," Poseidon told him.

"I know dad," Percy replied with a smile which Poseidon returned.

**She pursed her lips. She knew I was holding back, but she didn't push me.**

"**I have a surprise for you," she said. "We're going to the beach."**

**My eyes widened. "Montauk?"**

"**Three nights-same cabin."**

"**When?"**

**She smiled. "As soon as I get changed."**

**I couldn't believe it. My mom and I hadn't been to Montauk the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money.**

"Probably because he was gambling it," Aphrodite said recovering from fainting.

**Gabe appeared in the doorway and growled, "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?"**

**I wanted to punch him, but I met my mom's eyes and I understood she was offering me a deal: be nice to Gabe for a little while. Just until she was ready to leave for Montauk. Then we would get out of here.**

"**I was on my way, honey," she told Gabe. "We were just talking about the trip."**

**Gabe's eyes got small. "The trip? You mean you were serious about that?"**

"**I knew it," I muttered. "He won't let us go."**

"**Of course he will," my mom said evenly. "Your stepfather is just worried about money. That's all. Besides," she added, "Gabriel won't have to settle for bean dip. I'll make him enough seven-layer dip for the whole weekend. Guacamole. Sour cream. The works."**

**Gabe softened a bit. "So this money for your trip … it comes out of your clothes budget, right?"**

"You can't put a budget on clothes!" Aphrodite screeched.

"**Yes, honey," my mother said.**

"**And you won't take my car anywhere but there and back."**

"**We'll be very careful."**

**Gabe scratched his double chin. "Maybe if you hurry with that seven-layer dip … And maybe if the kid apologizes for interrupting my poker game."**

**Maybe if I kick you in your soft spot, I thought. And make you sing soprano for a week.**

Everyone laughed.

**But my mom's eyes warned me not to make him mad.**

**Why did she put up with this guy? I wanted to scream. Why did she care what he thought?**

"**I'm sorry," I muttered. "I'm really sorry I interrupted your incredibly important poker game. Please go back to it right now."**

**Gabe's eyes narrowed. His tiny brain was probably trying to detect sarcasm in my statement.**

"If he can't detect the sarcasm it that statement then he is dumber than I thought," Frank said.

"**Yeah, whatever," he decided.**

**He went back to his game.**

"**Thank you, Percy," my mom said. "Once we get to Montauk, we'll talk more about… whatever you've forgotten to tell me, okay?"**

"She knows," Hestia said softly.

**For a moment, I thought I saw anxiety in her eyes-the same fear I'd seen in Grover during the bus ride-as if my mom too felt an odd chill in the air.**

**But then her smile returned, and I figured I must have been mistaken. She ruffled my hair and went to make Gabe his seven-layer dip.**

**An hour later we were ready to leave.**

**Gabe took a break from his poker game long enough to watch me lug my mom's bags to the car. He kept griping and groaning about losing her cooking-and more important, his '78 Camaro-for the whole weekend.**

"**Not a scratch on this car, brain boy," he warned me as I loaded the last bag. "Not one little scratch."**

"Like he would be driving. He was 12!" Piper screamed.

**Like I'd be the one driving. I was twelve. But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame me.**

"You have PJS! Pretty soon we will all be infected!" the Stolls screamed. They got soaked.

Jason was seething with jealousy.

**Watching him lumber back toward the apartment building, I got so mad I did something I can't explain. As Gabe reached the doorway, I made the hand gesture I'd seen Grover make on the bus, a sort of warding-off-evil gesture, a clawed hand over my heart, then a shoving movement toward Gabe. The screen door slammed shut so hard it whacked him in the butt and sent him flying up the staircase as if he'd been shot from a cannon. Maybe it was just the wind, or some freak accident with the hinges, but I didn't stay long enough to find out.**

_He is too powerful! _Zeus thought.

**I got in the Camaro and told my mom to step on it.**

**Our rental cabin was on the south shore, way out at the tip of Long Island. It was a little pastel box with faded curtains, half sunken into the dunes. There was always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, and most of the time the sea was too cold to swim in.**

**I loved the place.**

"Of course you did," Thalia said while Annabeth and Athena shivered when the spiders were mentioned.

**We'd been going there since I was a baby. My mom had been going even longer. She never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place where she'd met my dad.**

Aphrodite squealed.

**As we got closer to Montauk, she seemed to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turned the color of the sea.**

"It's like her life force is the sea," Hestia said.

**We got there at sunset, opened all the cabin's windows, and went through our usual cleaning routine. We walked on the beach, fed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and munched on blue jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.**

"What's with the blue food?" Zeus grumbled.

**I guess I should explain the blue food.**

Everyone laughed.

**See, Gabe had once told my mom there was no such thing. They had this fight, which seemed like a really small thing at the time. But ever since, my mom went out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop. This-along with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano-was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like me.**

"Please it's more like Percy has an obedience streak!" Nico exclaimed.

**When it got dark, we made a fire. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom told me stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She told me about the books she wanted to write someday, when she had enough money to quit the candy shop.**

**Eventually, I got up the nerve to ask about what was always on my mind whenever we came to Montauk-my father. Mom's eyes went all misty. I figured she would tell me the same things she always did, but I never got tired of hearing them.**

"**He was kind, Percy," she said. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, too. You have his black hair, you know, and his green eyes."**

"He is right you know. I noticed it too," Demeter mused. Everyone looked back and forth between Percy and Poseidon and they all agreed.

**Mom fished a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy. He would be so proud."**

"I am," Poseidon said with a smile. Percy smiled back. _There is nothing to be proud of. _Jason and Hercules thought.

**I wondered how she could say that. What was so great about me? A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of school for the sixth time in six years.**

"I don't care about that," Poseidon said.

"**How old was I?" I asked. "I mean … when he left?"**

**She watched the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."**

"**But… he knew me as a baby."**

"**No, honey. He knew I was expecting a baby, but he never saw you. He had to leave before you were born."**

**I tried to square that with the fact that I seemed to remember … something about my father. A warm glow. A smile.**

Jason was ready to snap and rant about how it wasn't fair. The other demigods who knew Percy were a little jealous but if anyone deserved it, it was Percy.

**I had always assumed he knew me as a baby. My mom had never said it outright, but still, I'd felt it must be true. Now, to be told that he'd never even seen me …**

**I felt angry at my father. Maybe it was stupid, but I resented him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guts to marry my mom. He'd left us, and now we were stuck with Smelly Gabe.**

Poseidon looked down. Percy splashed some water on him to get his attention. Poseidon looked up to see his son smiling at him warmly and waving. Poseidon smiled and waved back happy that he didn't feel that way anymore.

"**Are you going to send me away again?" I asked her. "To another boarding school?"**

**She pulled a marshmallow from the fire.**

"**I don't know, honey." Her voice was heavy. "I think … I think we'll have to do something."**

"**Because you don't want me around?" I regretted the words as soon as they were out.**

Percy got slapped from Annabeth for that one.

**My mom's eyes welled with tears. She took my hand, squeezed it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I-I have to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away."**

**Her words reminded me of what Mr. Brunner had said-that it was best for me to leave Yancy.**

"**Because I'm not normal," I said.**

"Even by demigod standards Perc," the Stolls told him. Percy pouted.

"**You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd finally be safe."**

"**Safe from what?"**

"Oh nothing really just every monster, Titan, and some gods who want to kill you," Nico said cheerfully. Poseidon paled. _What did my son get into?_

**She met my eyes, and a flood of memories came back to me-all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me, some of which I'd tried to forget.**

**During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked me on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed me when I told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.**

"Why was there a Cyclops?" Katie asked. "He was there checking up on him," Poseidon answered.

**Before that-a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I'd somehow managed to strangle to death with my meaty toddler hands.**

Seeing what he did to Hercules nobody dared commenting.

**In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move.**

**I knew I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucination that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword. But I couldn't make myself tell her. I had a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk, and I didn't want that.**

"**I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom said. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other option, Percy-the place your father wanted to send you. And I just… I just can't stand to do it."**

"**My father wanted me to go to a special school?"**

"**Not a school," she said softly. "A summer camp."**

**My head was spinning. Why would my dad-who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me born- talk to my mom about a summer camp? And if it was so important, why hadn't she ever mentioned it before?**

"**I'm sorry, Percy," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I-I couldn't send you to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good."**

"**For good? But if it's only a summer camp …"**

**She turned toward the fire, and I knew from her expression that if I asked her any more questions she would start to cry.**

**That night I had a vivid dream.**

"Yours are always worse Seaweed Brain."

**It was storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse and a golden eagle, were trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swooped down and slashed the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse reared up and kicked at the eagles wings. As they fought, the ground rumbled, and a monstrous voice chuckled somewhere beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.**

**I ran toward them, knowing I had to stop them from killing each other, but I was running in slow motion. I knew I would be too late. I saw the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I screamed, No!**

"I WON!" Zeus exclaimed.

**I woke with a start.**

**Outside, it really was storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.**

**With the next thunderclap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."**

**I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seemed to have forgotten. Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.**

**Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice-someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.**

**My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock.**

**Grover stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he wasn't… he wasn't exactly Grover.**

"What do you mean?" Hermes and Apollo asked confused.

"**Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"**

"He doesn't Grover," Rachel told Grover. Percy stuck his tongue out at them.

**My mother looked at me in terror-not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come.**

"**Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"**

**I was frozen, looking at Grover. I couldn't understand what I was seeing.**

"**O Zeus kai alloi theoi!" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you tell her?"**

**I was too shocked to register that he'd just cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. I was too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten here by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on-and where his legs should be … where his legs should be …**

**My mom looked at me sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "Percy. Tell me now!"**

**I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.**

**She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. Both of you. Go!"**

**Grover ran for the Camaro-but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.**

**Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves.**

"That was such a boring ending!" Leo whined. "Okay, who's reading next?" Annabeth asked.

Katie raised her hand. "Chapter 4 **My Mother Teaches me Bullfighting**…"


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: I own nothing

* * *

**We tore through the night along dark country roads. Wind slammed against the Camaro. Rain lashed the wind-shield. I didn't know how my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas. **

"That's how you drive!" Ares yelled. "And that's why you end in my infirmary and your bike ends up in Hephaestus' shop!" Apollo exclaimed. Everyone laughed at Ares who fumed.

**Every time there was a flash of lightning, I looked at Grover sitting next to me in the backseat and I won-dered if I'd gone insane, or if he was wearing some kind of shag-carpet pants. But, no, the smell was one I remem-bered from kindergarten field trips to the petting zoo- lanolin, like from wool. The smell of a wet barnyard animal. **

**All I could think to say was, "So, you and my mom... Know each other?"**

"Seaweed Brain," Annabeth mutter fondly kissing Percy on the cheek.

**Graver's eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. "Not exactly, " he said. "I mean, we've never met in person. But she knew I was watching you. "**

"Stalker!" the Stoll brothers yelled. Katie and Rachael slapped them.

**"Watching me?"**

"Stalker," Travis and Connor muttered without the girls hearing them.

**"Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn't faking being your friend, " he added hastily. "I am your friend. "**

**"Urn ... What are you, exactly?"**

**"That doesn't matter right now. "**

**"It doesn't matter? From the waist down, my best friend is a donkey-"**

"He's not going to be very happy Perc," Nico told Percy. "Just read," Percy said.

_He's not very smart. _Jason and Hercules thought.

**Grover let out a sharp, throaty "Blaa-ha-ha!"**

**I'd heard him make that sound before, but I'd always assumed it was a nervous laugh. Now I realized it was more of an irritated bleat. **

**"Goat!" he cried. **

**"What?"**

**"I'm a goat from the waist down. "**

**"You just said it didn't matter. "**

"He's got you there goat boy," Thalia told Grover. Grover ignored her.

**"Blaa-ha-ha! There are satyrs who would trample you underhoof for such an insult!"**

**"Whoa. Wait. Satyrs. You mean like ... Mr. Brunner's myths?"**

"They are not his myths young hero," Hestia said. " I know Aunt Hestia but thank you for telling me," Percy replied.

"What did you call her you.. you… ungrateful mortal!" Zeus thundered. "You will be dtriked down for saying things like that!"

"Peace Zeus. I've always wanted the demigods to call me that if I find them worthy and it seems that I have found Perseus here worthy and I thank him for that." Hestia said smiling at Percy.

"Percy smiled back. Jason and Hercules were seething.

**"Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a myth, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?"**

**"So you admit there was a Mrs. Dodds!"**

_Stupid Sea Spawn. _Athena thought.

**"Of course. "**

**"Then why-"**

**"The less you knew, the fewer monsters you'd attract, " Grover said, like that should be perfectly obvious. "We put Mist over the humans' eyes. We hoped you'd think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are. "**

**"Who I-wait a minute, what do you mean?" The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind us, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail. **

Poseidon paled.

**"Percy, " my mom said, "there's too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety. "**

**"Safety from what? Who's after me?"**

**"Oh, nobody much, " Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. "Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions. "**

"And it gets worse as he gets older!" Grover exclaimed.

**"Grover!"**

**"Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?"**

**I tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, but I couldn't do it. I knew this wasn't a dream. I had no imagination. I could never dream up something this weird. **

**My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hills and PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES signs on white picket fences. **

**"Where are we going?" I asked. **

"Go camp Half Blood!" all the demigods from there shouted. Hazel and Frank couldn't wait to go to the Greek camp.

**"The summer camp I told you about. " My mother's voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. "The place your father wanted to send you. "**

**"The place you didn't want me to go. "**

**"Please, dear, " my mother begged. "This is hard enough. Try to understand. You're in danger. "**

**"Because some old ladies cut yarn. "**

"They are not just some old ladies Perseus," Artemis said.

**"Those weren't old ladies, " Grover said. "Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means-the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you're about to ... When someone's about to die. "**

**"Whoa. You said 'you. '"**

**"No I didn't. I said 'someone. '"**

**"You meant 'you. ' As in me. "**

**"I meant you, like 'someone. ' Not you, you. "**

"What?" everyone said.

**"Boys!" my mom said. **

"Thank you!" Thalia and Artemis yelled. They smiled at each other.

**She pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she'd swerved to avoid a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm. **

**"What was that?" I asked. **

**"We're almost there, " my mother said, ignoring my question. "Another mile. Please. Please. Please. "**

"Please, please, please," Poseidon chanted.

**I didn't know where there was, but I found myself leaning forward in the car, anticipating, wanting us to arrive. **

All the demigods but Jason and Hercules were doing the same.

**Outside, nothing but rain and darkness-the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island. I thought about Mrs. Dodds and the moment when she'd changed into the thing with pointed teeth and leathery wings. My limbs went numb from delayed shock. She really hadn't been human. She'd meant to kill me. **

_My god he is sooo slow! I'm so much better than him! _Jason thought.

**Then I thought about Mr. Brunner ... And the sword he had thrown me. Before I could ask Grover about that, the hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling boom, and our car exploded. **

**I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried, and hosed down all at the same time. **

**I peeled my forehead off the back of the driver's seat and said, "Ow. "**

"Dude that's all you say!" Leo shouted. "I would've been like ouch and like I'm going to faint now," Everyone looked at him weird.

**"Percy!" my mom shouted. **

**"I'm okay..."**

**I tried to shake off the daze. I wasn't dead. The car hadn't really exploded. We'd swerved into a ditch. Our driver's-side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like an eggshell and rain was pouring in. **

**Lightning. That was the only explanation. We'd been blasted right off the road. Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump. "Grover!"**

**He was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of his mouth. I shook his furry hip, thinking, No! Even if you are half barnyard animal, you're my best friend and I don't want you to die!**

"Thanks… I think," Grover said.

**Then he groaned "Food, " and I knew there was hope. **

**"Percy, " my mother said, "we have to ... " Her voice faltered. **

**I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl. It was a dark silhouette of a huge guy, like a football player. He seemed to be holding a blanket over his head. His top half was bulky and fuzzy. His upraised hands made it look like he had horns. **

"You faced the minotaur!" Theseus exclaimed. He wanted to see how his younger brother handled the monster he was famous for beating. _He's dead. _Was going through Jason's and Hercules' head.

**I swallowed hard. "Who is-"**

**"Percy, " my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car. "**

**My mother threw herself against the driver's-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked up desperately at the hole in the roof. It might've been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking. **

**"Climb out the passenger's side!" my mother told me. "Percy-you have to run. Do you see that big tree?"**

"Hey it's me!" Thalia said.

**"What?"**

**Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, White House Christmas tree-sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill. **

**"That's the property line, " my mom said. "Get over that hill and you'll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don't look back. Yell for help. Don't stop until you reach the door. "**

**"Mom, you're coming too. "**

**Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean. **

**"No!" I shouted. "You are coming with me. Help me carry Grover. "**

You're very loyal to your mother," Hera told Percy.

**"Food!" Grover moaned, a little louder. **

The demigods laughed.

**The man with the blanket on his head kept coming toward us, making his grunting, snorting noises. As he got closer, I realized he couldn't be holding a blanket over his head, because his hands-huge meaty hands-were swing-ing at his sides. There was no blanket. Meaning the bulky, fuzzy mass that was too big to be his head ... Was his head. And the points that looked like horns ... **

**"He doesn't want us, " my mother told me. "He wants you. Besides, I can't cross the property line. "**

**"But... "**

**"We don't have time, Percy. Go. Please. "**

Poseidon became a puddle. "Don't worry he becomes a puddle when he's stressed." Apollo told everyone who then nodded.

**I got mad, then-mad at my mother, at Grover the goat, at the thing with horns that was lumbering toward us slowly and deliberately like, like a bull. **

**I climbed across Grover and pushed the door open into the rain. "We're going together. Come on, Mom. "**

**"I told you-"**

**"Mom! I am not leaving you. Help me with Grover. "**

**I didn't wait for her answer. I scrambled outside, drag-ging Grover from the car. He was surprisingly light, but I couldn't have carried him very far if my mom hadn't come to my aid. **

**Together, we draped Grover's arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist- high grass. **

**Glancing back, I got my first clear look at the monster. He was seven feet tall, easy, his arms and legs like something from the cover of Muscle Man magazine-bulging biceps and triceps and a bunch of other 'ceps, all stuffed like baseballs under vein-webbed skin. He wore no clothes except under-wear-I mean, bright white Fruit of the Looms**

"Oh My GOD!" Leo, the stoll brothers, Apollo, and Hermes laughed. Everyone else was cracking up too.

**which would've looked funny, except that the top half of his body was so scary. Coarse brown hair started at about his belly button and got thicker as it reached his shoulders. **

"It's still funny," you can guess who said that.

**His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horns-enormous black-and- white horns with points you just couldn't get from an electric sharpener. **

"You have the weirdest thoughts Prissy," Clarisse told him. The other demigods except those who don't like him nodded.

**I recognized the monster, all right. He had been in one of the first stories Mr. Brunner told us. But he couldn't be real. **

**I blinked the rain out of my eyes. "That's-"**

**"Pasiphae's son, " my mother said. "I wish I'd known how badly they want to kill you."**

**"But he's the Min-"**

**"Don't say his name, " she warned. "Names have power. "**

"She's very smart," Athena said.

**The pine tree was still way too far-a hundred yards uphill at least. **

**I glanced behind me again. **

**The bull-man hunched over our car, looking in the win-dows-or not looking, exactly. More like snuffling, nuz-zling. I wasn't sure why he bothered, since we were only about fifty feet away. **

**"Food?" Grover moaned. **

**"Shhh, " I told him. "Mom, what's he doing? Doesn't he see us?"**

**"His sight and hearing are terrible, " she said. "He goes by smell. But he'll figure out where we are soon enough. "**

**As if on cue, the bull-man bellowed in rage. He picked up Gabe's Camaro by the torn roof, the chassis creaking and groaning. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to a stop. The gas tank exploded. **

**Not a scratch, I remembered Gabe saying. **

**Oops. **

Everyone laughed.

**"Percy, " my mom said. "When he sees us, he'll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way- directly sideways. He can't change directions very well once he's charging. Do you understand?"**

**"How do you know all this?"**

**"I've been worried about an attack for a long time. I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me. "**

**"Keeping me near you? But-"**

**Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill. **

**He'd smelled us. **

Annabeth looked at Percy just to make sure he was still there.

**The pine tree was only a few more yards, but the hill was getting steeper and slicker, and Grover wasn't getting any lighter. **

**The bull-man closed in. Another few seconds and he'd be on top of us. **

**My mother must've been exhausted, but she shouldered Grover. "Go, Percy! Separate! Remember what I said. "**

**I didn't want to split up, but I had the feeling she was right-it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat. **

**He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest. **

Annabeth started shaking.

**The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing. So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side. **

**The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, then bel-lowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, toward my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass. **

Everyone was horrified.

**We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother had said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it. **

**The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover. **

**"Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"**

**But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. He lifted her as she struggled, kicking and pummeling the air. **

**"Mom!"**

**She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!"**

**Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash, and she was simply ... Gone. **

Percy had a few stray tears leaking down his cheeks.

**"No!"**

**Anger replaced my fear. Newfound strength burned in my limbs-the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons. **

"Go Percy!" the Stolls yelled.

**The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too. **

**I couldn't allow that. **

**I stripped off my red rain jacket. **

**"Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"**

"I like your insults," Apollo said.

**"Raaaarrrrr!" The monster turned toward me, shaking his meaty fists. **

**I had an idea-a stupid idea, but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment. **

**But it didn't happen like that. **

**The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge. **

**Time slowed down. **

**My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off from the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in midair, and landing on his neck. **

Everyone was astounded. _Please that was nothing. I'm going to have to show everyone who's boss soon. _Jason thought.

**How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out. **

**The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils. **

**The monster shook himself around and bucked like a rodeo bull. He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only one gear: forward. **

**Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off. **

**"Food!" Grover moaned. **

**The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again, and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out of my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then-snap!**

_He's good. _The heroes of old except for Hercules thought.

**The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife. **

" No way… that's how you got it," Nico said.

**The monster charged. **

**Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage. **

**The bull-man roared in agony. He flailed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate-not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart. **

**The monster was gone. **

"Yah!" the demigods and gods who like Percy cheered. Poseidon became solid again. He was very proud of his son.

**The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled like livestock and my knees were shaking. My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover, needing my help, so I managed to haul him up and stagger down into the valley, toward the lights of the farm-house. I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held on to Grover-I wasn't going to let him go. **

"Thanks for that," Grover said. He was happy he had such a good friend.

**The last thing I remember is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's. They both looked down at me, and the girl said, "He's the one. He must be. "**

"AWWWWW!" Aphrodite shouted making everyone deaf for a little bit.

**"Silence, Annabeth, " the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside. "**

"Okay so who's reading next?" Katie asked. "I will," Hazel said. "Chapter 5 **I play Pinochle with a horse**…"


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: This whole story will be in 3rd person unless it says otherwise! I own nothing!

* * *

**I had weird dreams full of barnyard animals. Most of them wanted to kill me. The rest wanted food. **

"You have some really weird dreams Perc," Nico told him.

**I must've woken up several times, but what I heard and saw made no sense, so I just passed out again. I remember lying in a soft bed, being spoon-fed something that tasted like buttered popcorn, only it was pudding. The girl with curly blond hair hovered over me, smirking as she scraped drips off my chin with the spoon. **

**When she saw my eyes open, she asked, "What will happen at the summer solstice?"**

"You actually thought that Kelp Head knew something Annabeth?" Thalia asked her. "I didn't know him then," Annabeth replied. Percy pouted. Annabeth kissed him making him smile.

**I managed to croak, "What?"**

**She looked around, as if afraid someone would over-hear. "What's going on? What was stolen? We've only got a few weeks!"**

**"I'm sorry," I mumbled, "I don't... "**

**Somebody knocked on the door, and the girl quickly filled my mouth with pudding. **

"I wish I had thought of that!" Katie told Annabeth.

**The next time I woke up, the girl was gone. **

"Aww you miss your little girlfriend?" the Stolls mocked. Percy drenched them.

_Will his father stop helping him get people wet? _Jason thought to himself.

**A husky blond dude, like a surfer, stood in the corner of the bedroom keeping watch over me. He had blue eyes- at least a dozen of them-on his cheeks, his forehead, the backs of his hands. **

"Does he have an eye on his tongue?" Leo asked. "Leo why don't you hit yourself?" Piper asked him using charm speak. Needless to say, Leo got a nice red spot on his cheek.

**When I finally came around for good, there was nothing weird about my surroundings, except that they were nicer than I was used to. I was sitting in a deck chair on a huge porch, gazing across a meadow at green hills in the distance. The breeze smelled like strawberries. There was a blanket over my legs, a pillow behind my neck. All that was great, but my mouth felt like a scorpion had been using it for a nest. My tongue was dry and nasty and every one of my teeth hurt. **

"How does he know what these things feel like?" Orion asked his brother Theseus. "I don't know," Theseus replied.

**On the table next to me was a tall drink. It looked like iced apple juice, with a green straw and a paper parasol stuck through a maraschino cherry. **

**My hand was so weak I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it. **

**"Careful," a familiar voice said. **

**Grover was leaning against the porch railing, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. Under one arm, he cradled a shoe box. He was wearing blue jeans, Converse hi-tops and a bright orange T-shirt that said CAMP HALF-BLOOD. Just plain old Grover, Not the goat boy. **

**So maybe I'd had a nightmare. Maybe my mom was okay. We were still on vacation, and we'd stopped here at this big house for some reason. And ... **

Percy looked down. Even though he knew she was okay he still hated hearing about it. Clouds started to form over Olympus. Everyone looked up when a sudden shadow came over them. Everyone noticing the clouds turned to Zeus. He looked bewildered and was trying to put them out but he couldn't. Everyone looked to the three children of Zeus but they shook their heads.

"We can't do anything like this," Perseus answered for Jason and Hercules.

It started to rain. Everyone was getting drenched including Poseidon except for Percy. He was still thinking about his mom and how he thought she was dead. He then thought about Gabe hitting her and thunder shook Olympus.

Annabeth noticed that Percy wasn't getting wet. "PERCY! I know your upset about what happened to your mom but you need to calm down before you make another hurricane!"

Everyone turned to Percy who was shaking hard. Annabeth was trying to get through to him. She had enough talking to him so she started to kiss him. Percy responded to her. The clouds started to disappear until they were gone. Everyone was astounded.

"How did you do that Perc?" Grover asked.

"Yeah! That was sooooo cool!" Leo said. The gods and goddesses were amazed that a demigod was that powerful. Poseidon was just proud.

Percy finally done kissing Annabeth said, "Dad is the god of storms what do you expect?"

"Yeah but we can't do a quarter of the things you do!" Theseus and Orion exclaimed.

Percy just shrugged. "So can we continue to read now?"

**"You saved my life," Grover said. "I... Well, the least I could do ... I went back to the hill. I thought you might want this."**

**Reverently, he placed the shoe box in my lap. **

**Inside was a black-and-white bull's horn, the base jagged from being broken off, the tip splattered with dried blood. It hadn't been a nightmare. **

**"The Minotaur," I said. **

"Didn't your mother tell you that names have power?" Athena asked.

"Yeah but they are just going to try and kill me anyway so why not call them by their names? Besides, I'm on the top of the monster hit list so where is the fun if you can't mock them and call them by their names?"

**"Urn, Percy, it isn't a good idea-"**

**"That's what they call him in the Greek myths, isn't it?" I demanded. "The Minotaur. Half man, half bull. "**

**Grover shifted uncomfortably. "You've been out for two days. How much do you remember?"**

**"My mom. Is she really ... "**

**He looked down. **

**I stared across the meadow. There were groves of trees, a winding stream, acres of strawberries spread out under the blue sky. The valley was surrounded by rolling hills, and the tallest one, directly in front of us, was the one with the huge pine tree on top. Even that looked beautiful in the sunlight. **

"I didn't know you could be so deep Percy," Rachael told Percy. "Oh he can be when he wants to be!" Annabeth replied kissing Percy's cheek.

**My mother was gone. The whole world should be black and cold. Nothing should look beautiful. **

Aphrodite had tears in her eyes.

**"I'm sorry," Grover sniffled. "I'm a failure. I'm-I'm the worst satyr in the world. "**

"That's not true Grover! You found pan and caused a panic! You're a lord of the wild!" Percy told his friend. "Yeah," the other demigods that liked him said. Hermes was happy. His son had been found.

**He moaned, stomping his foot so hard it came off. I mean, the Converse hi-top came off. The inside was filled with Styrofoam, except for a hoof-shaped hole. **

_That's not weird at all. _Orion thought.

**"Oh, Styx!" he mumbled.**

**Thunder rolled across the clear sky. **

**As he struggled to get his hoof back in the fake foot, I thought, Well, that settles it. **

The usual people started to laugh and the usual people hit them.

**Grover was a satyr. I was ready to bet that if I shaved his curly brown hair, I'd find tiny horns on his head. But I was too miserable to care that satyrs existed, or even minotaurs. All that meant was my mom really had been squeezed into nothingness, dissolved into yellow light. **

_Why would I take his mom?_ Hades wondered.

**I was alone. An orphan. I would have to live with ... Smelly Gabe? No. That would never happen. I would live on the streets first. I would pretend I was seventeen and join the army. I'd do something. **

"You would live here on Olympus before that happened," Poseidon told his son who beamed at him. The other demigods got jealous but again figured that Percy deserved a nice dad. Well Jason was still jealous.

**Grover was still sniffling. The poor kid-poor goat, satyr, whatever-looked as if he expected to be hit. **

**I said, "It wasn't your fault. "**

**"Yes, it was. I was supposed to protect you. "**

**"Did my mother ask you to protect me?"**

**"No. But that's my job. I'm a keeper. At least... I was. "**

**"But why ... " I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision swimming. **

"Did anyone notice that Percy here likes to compare things with the ocean?" Apollo asked. Everyone nodded.

**"Don't strain yourself, " Grover said. "Here. " He helped me hold my glass and put the straw to my lips. **

**I recoiled at the taste, because I was expecting apple juice. It wasn't that at all. It was chocolate-chip cookies. Liquid cookies. And not just any cookies-my mom's homemade blue chocolate-chip cookies, buttery and hot, with the chips still melting. **

"Those are the best!" Nico yelled. "I can get some for you next time I go home," Percy replied. Nico nodded licking his lips.

**Drinking it, my whole body felt warm and good, full of energy. My grief didn't go away, but I felt as if my mom had just brushed her hand against my cheek, given me a cookie the way she used to when I was small, and told me everything was going to be okay. **

"Momma's boy," Ares muttered only to get soaked by the father of said boy.

**Before I knew it, I'd drained the glass. I stared into it, sure I'd just had a warm drink, but the ice cubes hadn't even melted.**

**"Was it good?" Grover asked. **

**I nodded. **

**"What did it taste like?" He sounded so wistful, I felt guilty. **

**"Sorry," I said. "I should've let you taste."**

"I really rather not," Grover said.

**His eyes got wide. "No! That's not what I meant. I just... Wondered. "**

**"Chocolate-chip cookies, " I said. "My mom's. Home-made. "**

**He sighed. "And how do you feel?"**

**"Like I could throw Nancy Bobofit a hundred yards. "**

"Is that good?" Demeter asked. "For me yes for Nancy…" Percy replied.

**"That's good, " he said. "That's good. I don't think you could risk drinking any more of that stuff"**

**"What do you mean?"**

**He took the empty glass from me gingerly, as if it were dynamite, and set it back on the table. "Come on. Chiron and Mr. D are waiting. "**

**The porch wrapped all the way around the farmhouse. **

**My legs felt wobbly, trying to walk that far. Grover offered to carry the Minotaur horn, but I held on to it. I'd paid for that souvenir the hard way. I wasn't going to let it go. **

Aphrodite started to cry again.

**As we came around the opposite end of the house, I caught my breath. **

**We must've been on the north shore of Long Island, because on this side of the house, the valley marched all the way up to the water, which glittered about a mile in the distance. Between here and there, I simply couldn't process everything I was seeing. The landscape was dotted with buildings that looked like ancient Greek architecture-an open-air pavilion, an amphitheater, a circular arena-except that they all looked brand new, their white marble columns sparkling in the sun.**

"It sounds so beautiful! I can't wait to see it!" Hazel told the greek demigods.

**In a nearby sandpit, a dozen high school-age kids and satyrs played volleyball. Canoes glided across a small lake. Kids in bright orange T-shirts like Grover's were chasing each other around a cluster of cabins nestled in the woods. Some shot targets at an archery range. Others rode horses down a wooded trail, and, unless I was hallucinating, some of their horses had wings. **

"I love the Pegasus! I really miss Blackjack. How is he by the way?" Percy asked his girlfriend. "You might like them because they treat you like royalty and Blackjack has missed you," she replied.

"Why do they treat you like royalty?" Piper asked. "Dad made them so they love him and his sons," Percy told her. _Wow! That is soooo sissy! _Jason and Hercules were thinking.

**Down at the end of the porch, two men sat across from each other at a card table. The blond-haired girl who'd spoon-fed me popcorn-flavored pudding was leaning on the porch rail next to them. **

**The man facing me was small, but porky.**

Dionysus' eyes got smaller.

**He had a red nose, big watery eyes, and curly hair so black it was almost purple. **

He started to growl.

**He looked like those paintings of baby angels- what do you call them, hubbubs? No, cherubs. That's it. **

**He looked like a cherub who'd turned middle-aged in a trailer park. **

He exploded. "PERRY!" vines came up and wrapped them around Percy. Percy just looked down at them and they died.

"What did you do to my vines?!" Dionysus screamed. "I took all the water out of them," Percy told him calmly and everyone gaped at him.

**He wore a tiger- pattern Hawaiian shirt, and he would've fit right in at one of Gabe's poker parties, except I got the feeling this guy could've out-gambled even my step-father. **

"You got that right!"

**"That's Mr. D," Grover murmured to me. "He's the camp director. Be polite. The girl, that's Annabeth Chase. She's just a camper, but she's been here longer than just about anybody. And you already know Chiron..."**

**He pointed at the guy whose back was to me. **

**First, I realized he was sitting in the wheelchair. Then I recognized the tweed jacket, the thinning brown hair, the scraggly beard. **

**"Mr. Brunner!" I cried. **

"Didn't he just say his name was Chiron?" Perseus asked. "I can be a little slow I admit."

**The Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. His eyes had that mischievous glint they sometimes got in class when he pulled a pop quiz and made all the multiple choice answers B. **

"I wish our teachers did that!" the Stolls exclaimed.

**"Ah, good, Percy," he said. "Now we have four for pinochle. "**

**He offered me a chair to the right of Mr. D, who looked at me with bloodshot eyes and heaved a great sigh. "Oh, I suppose I must say it. Welcome to Camp Half-Blood. There. Now, don't expect me to be glad to see you. "**

**"Uh, thanks." I scooted a little farther away from him because, if there was one thing I had learned from living with Gabe, it was how to tell when an adult has been hit-ting the happy juice. If Mr. D was a stranger to alcohol, I was a satyr. **

The demigods snorted.

**"Annabeth?" Mr. Brunner called to the blond girl.**

"What's with the blond girl crap Seaweed Brain?" Annabeth asked him. Percy just smiled at her and kissed her.

**She came forward and Mr. Brunner introduced us. "This young lady nursed you back to health, Percy. Annabeth, my dear, why don't you go check on Percy's bunk? We'll be putting him in cabin eleven for now. "**

**Annabeth said, "Sure, Chiron."**

**She was probably my age, maybe a couple of inches taller, and a whole lot more athletic looking. **

"That's right Seaweed Brain,"

**With her deep tan and her curly blond hair, she was almost exactly what I thought a stereotypical California girl would look like, except her eyes ruined the image. **

"And what does that mean?" Annabeth asked. Percy pointed to the book.

**They were startling gray, like storm clouds; pretty, but intimidating, too, as if she were analyzing the best way to take me down in a fight. **

"That's okay then," Annabeth said kissing him. "You look _very _athletic now," Annabeth murmured to him. Percy blushed.

**She glanced at the minotaur horn in my hands, then back at me. I imagined she was going to say, You killed a minotaur! or Wow, you're so awesome! or something like that. **

"You wish!" Thalia told Percy.

**Instead she said, "You drool when you sleep. "**

Everyone laughed.

**Then she sprinted off down the lawn, her blond hair flying behind her. **

**"So," I said, anxious to change the subject. "You, uh, work here, Mr. Brunner?"**

"Smooth Percy," Nico said.

**"Not Mr. Brunner," the ex-Mr. Brunner said. "I'm afraid that was a pseudonym. You may call me Chiron. "**

**"Okay." Totally confused, I looked at the director. "And Mr. D ... Does that stand for something?"**

_He is REALLY slow._ Jason thought. _How can he be this all powerful person when his is this stupid. This proves that I was right in thinking that his dad has helped him look powerful._

**Mr. D stopped shuffling the cards. He looked at me like I'd just belched loudly. "Young man, names are powerful things. You don't just go around using them for no reason. "**

**"Oh. Right. Sorry. "**

**"I must say, Percy," Chiron-Brunner broke in, "I'm glad to see you alive. It's been a long time since I've made a house call to a potential camper. I'd hate to think I've wasted my time. "**

**"House call?"**

**"My year at Yancy Academy, to instruct you. We have satyrs at most schools, of course, keeping a lookout. But Grover alerted me as soon as he met you. He sensed you were something special, so I decided to come upstate. I convinced the other Latin teacher to ... Ah, take a leave of absence. "**

**I tried to remember the beginning of the school year. It seemed like so long ago, but I did have a fuzzy memory of there being another Latin teacher my first week at Yancy. Then, without explanation, he had disappeared and Mr. Brunner had taken the class. **

**"You came to Yancy just to teach me?" I asked. **

"NOOOOO don't let his ego get any bigger!" Thalia screamed. "I don't have one!" Percy replied. "I know I'm just joking," some though thought that she wasn't.

**Chiron nodded. "Honestly, I wasn't sure about you at first. We contacted your mother, let her know we were keeping an eye on you in case you were ready for Camp Half-Blood. But you still had so much to learn. Nevertheless, you made it here alive, and that's always the first test. "**

**"Grover," Mr. D said impatiently, "are you playing or not?"**

**"Yes, sir!" Grover trembled as he took the fourth chair, though I didn't know why he should be so afraid of a pudgy little man in a tiger-print Hawaiian shirt. **

**"You do know how to play pinochle?" Mr. D eyed me suspiciously. **

**"I'm afraid not," I said. **

**"I'm afraid not, sir," he said. **

**"Sir," I repeated. I was liking the camp director less and less. **

"You're not the only one," Katie said.

**"Well," he told me, "it is, along with gladiator fighting and Pac-Man, one of the greatest games ever invented by humans. I would expect all civilized young men to know the rules. "**

**"I'm sure the boy can learn, " Chiron said. **

**"Please," I said, "what is this place? What am I doing here? Mr. Brun-Chiron-why would you go to Yancy Academy just to teach me?"**

"Ego," Nico coughed.

**Mr. D snorted. "I asked the same question."**

**The camp director dealt the cards. Grover flinched every time one landed in his pile. **

**Chiron smiled at me sympathetically, the way he used to in Latin class, as if to let me know that no matter what my average was, I was his star student. He expected me to have the right answer. **

**"Percy," he said. "Did your mother tell you nothing?'**

**"She said ... "I remembered her sad eyes, looking out over the sea. "She told me she was afraid to send me here, even though my father had wanted her to. She said that once I was here, I probably couldn't leave. She wanted to keep me close to her. "**

**"Typical," Mr. D said. "That's how they usually get killed. Young man, are you bidding or not?"**

"That's mean!" Demeter yelled at Dionysus. She hit him.

**"What?" I asked. **

**He explained, impatiently, how you bid in pinochle, and so I did. **

**"I'm afraid there's too much to tell," Chiron said. "I'm afraid our usual orientation film won't be sufficient. "**

**"Orientation film?" I asked. **

"You didn't see it?" the Stolls asked. Percy nodded.

**"No," Chiron decided. "Well, Percy. You know your friend Grover is a satyr. You know"-he pointed to the horn in the shoe box-"that you have killed the Minotaur. No small feat, either, lad. What you may not know is that great powers are at work in your life. Gods-the forces you call the Greek gods-are very much alive. "**

**I stared at the others around the table. **

**I waited for somebody to yell, Not! But all I got was Mr. D yelling, "Oh, a royal marriage. Trick! Trick!" He cackled as he tallied up his points. **

**"Mr. D," Grover asked timidly, "if you're not going to eat it, could I have your Diet Coke can?"**

**"Eh? Oh, all right. "**

**Grover bit a huge shard out of the empty aluminum can and chewed it mournfully. **

**"Wait," I told Chiron. "You're telling me there's such a thing as God. "**

**"Well, now, "Chiron said. "God-capital G, God. That's a different matter altogether. We shan't deal with the metaphysical. "**

**"Metaphysical? But you were just talking about-"**

**"Ah, gods, plural, as in, great beings that control the forces of nature and human endeavors: the immortal gods of Olympus. That's a smaller matter. "**

The gods and goddesses raised their eyebrows.

**"Smaller?"**

**"Yes, quite. The gods we discussed in Latin class. "**

**"Zeus," I said. "Hera. Apollo. You mean them. "**

"Yeah I'm mentioned!" you can guess who said that.

**And there it was again-distant thunder on a cloudless day.**

**"Young man," said Mr. D, "I would really be less casual about throwing those names around, if I were you."**

**"But they're stories, "I said. "They're-myths, to explain lightning and the seasons and stuff. They're what people believed before there was science. "**

**"Science!" Mr. D scoffed. "And tell me, Perseus Jackson"**

**I flinched when he said my real name, which I never told anybody**

**"what will people think of your 'science' two thousand years from now?" **

**Mr. D continued. "Hmm? They will call it primitive mumbo jumbo. That's what. Oh, I love mortals-they have absolutely no sense of perspective. They think they've come sooo far. And have they, Chiron? Look at this boy and tell me. "**

**I wasn't liking Mr. D much, but there was something about the way he called me mortal, as if... He wasn't. It was enough to put a lump in my throat, to suggest why Grover was dutifully minding his cards, chewing his soda can, and keeping his mouth shut. **

**"Percy," Chiron said, "you may choose to believe or not, but the fact is that immortal means immortal. Can you imagine that for a moment, never dying? Never fading? Existing, just as you are, for all time?"**

"I was offered and no thank you," the gods and goddesses looked at him all wondering _when was he offered and why?_

**I was about to answer, off the top of my head, that it sounded like a pretty good deal, but the tone of Chiron's voice made me hesitate. **

**"You mean, whether people believed in you or not, " I said. **

**"Exactly," Chiron agreed. "If you were a god, how would you like being called a myth, an old story to explain lightning? What if I told you, Perseus Jackson, that someday people would call you a myth, just created to explain how little boys can get over losing their mothers?"**

"That was harsh," Poseidon told his son who agreed with him.

**My heart pounded. He was trying to make me angry for some reason, but I wasn't going to let him. I said, "I wouldn't like it. But I don't believe in gods. "**

**"Oh, you'd better," Mr. D murmured. "Before one of them incinerates you. "**

"Not if you don't want to become seawater," Poseidon told the god.

**Grover said, "P-please, sir. He's just lost his mother. He's in shock. "**

**"A lucky thing, too," Mr. D grumbled, playing a card. "Bad enough I'm confined to this miserable job, working with boys who don't even believe. '"**

**He waved his hand and a goblet appeared on the table, as if the sunlight had bent, momentarily, and woven the air into glass. The goblet filled itself with red wine. **

**My jaw dropped, but Chiron hardly looked up. **

**"Mr. D," he warned, "your restrictions."**

**Mr. D looked at the wine and feigned surprise. **

**"Dear me." He looked at the sky and yelled, "Old habits! Sorry!"**

Zeus looked at his son.

**More thunder. **

**Mr. D waved his hand again, and the wineglass changed into a fresh can of Diet Coke. He sighed unhappily, popped the top of the soda, and went back to his card game. **

**Chiron winked at me. "Mr. D offended his father a while back, took a fancy to a wood nymph who had been declared off-limits."**

**"A wood nymph," I repeated, still staring at the Diet Coke can like it was from outer space. **

**"Yes," Mr. D confessed. "Father loves to punish me. **

"I wouldn't have to if you would just listen,"

**The first time, Prohibition. Ghastly! Absolutely horrid ten years! **

**The second time-well, she really was pretty, and I couldn't stay away-the second time, he sent me here. **

**Half-Blood Hill. Summer camp for brats like you. 'Be a better influence, ' he told me. 'Work with youths rather than tearing them down. ' Ha. ' Absolutely unfair. "**

"Yeah for us," Leo said and the demigods who had him as a counselor agreed.

**Mr. D sounded about six years old, like a pouting little kid. **

**"And ... " I stammered, "your father is ... "**

**"Di immortales, Chiron," Mr. D said. "I thought you taught this boy the basics. My father is Zeus, of course. "**

**I ran through D names from Greek mythology. Wine. The skin of a tiger. The satyrs that all seemed to work here. The way Grover cringed, as if Mr. D were his master. **

**"You're Dionysus," I said. "The god of wine."**

**Mr. D rolled his eyes. "What do they say, these days, Grover? Do the children say, 'Well, duh!'?"**

**"Y-yes, Mr. D."**

**"Then, well, duh! Percy Jackson. Did you think I was Aphrodite, perhaps?"**

"**You're a god."**

**"Yes, child."**

**"A god. You. "**

Dionysus glared at Percy.

**He turned to look at me straight on, and I saw a kind of purplish fire in his eyes, a hint that this whiny, plump little man was only showing me the tiniest bit of his true nature. I saw visions of grape vines choking unbelievers to death, drunken warriors insane with battle lust, sailors screaming as their hands turned to flippers, their faces elon-gating into dolphin snouts. I knew that if I pushed him, Mr. D would show me worse things. He would plant a disease in my brain that would leave me wearing a strait-jacket in a rubber room for the rest of my life. **

Poseidon looked at him in warning and Dionysus gulped.

**"Would you like to test me, child?" he said quietly. **

**"No. No, sir. "**

**The fire died a little. He turned back to his card game. "I believe I win."**

**"Not quite, Mr. D," Chiron said. He set down a straight, tallied the points, and said, "The game goes to me."**

**I thought Mr. D was going to vaporize Chiron right out of his wheelchair, but he just sighed through his nose, as if he were used to being beaten by the Latin teacher. He got up, and Grover rose, too. **

**"I'm tired," Mr. D said. "I believe I'll take a nap before the sing-along tonight. But first, Grover, we need to talk, again, about your less-than-perfect performance on this assignment. "**

**Grover's face beaded with sweat. "Y-yes, sir."**

**Mr. D turned to me. "Cabin eleven, Percy Jackson. And mind your manners. "**

**He swept into the farmhouse, Grover following miser-ably. **

**"Will Grover be okay?" I asked Chiron. **

**Chiron nodded, though he looked a bit troubled. "Old Dionysus isn't really mad. He just hates his job. He's been ... Ah, grounded, I guess you would say, and he can't stand waiting another century before he's allowed to go back to Olympus. "**

**"Mount Olympus," I said. "You're telling me there really is a palace there?"**

**"Well now, there's Mount Olympus in Greece. And then there's the home of the gods, the convergence point of their powers, which did indeed used to be on Mount Olympus. It's still called Mount Olympus, out of respect to the old ways, but the palace moves, Percy, just as the gods do. "**

**"You mean the Greek gods are here? Like ... In America?"**

**"Well, certainly. The gods move with the heart of the West. "**

**"The what?"**

"Here comes one of his boring explanations," the Stolls said.

**"Come now, Percy. What you call 'Western civilization. ' Do you think it's just an abstract concept? No, it's a living force. A collective consciousness that has burned bright for thousands of years. The gods are part of it. You might even say they are the source of it, or at least, they are tied so tightly to it that they couldn't possibly fade, not unless all of Western civilization were obliterated. The fire started in Greece. Then, as you well know-or as I hope you know, since you passed my course-the heart of the fire moved to Rome, and so did the gods. Oh, different names, perhaps-Jupiter for Zeus, Venus for Aphrodite, and so on-but the same forces, the same gods. "**

**"And then they died."**

**"Died? No. Did the West die? The gods simply moved, to Germany, to France, to Spain, for a while. Wherever the flame was brightest, the gods were there. They spent several centuries in England. All you need to do is look at the architecture. People do not forget the gods. Every place they've ruled, for the last three thousand years, you can see them in paintings, in statues, on the most important buildings. And yes, Percy, of course they are now in your United States. Look at your symbol, the eagle of Zeus. Look at the statue of Prometheus in Rockefeller Center, the Greek facades of your government buildings in Washington. I defy you to find any American city where the Olympians are not prominently displayed in multiple places. Like it or not-and believe me, plenty of people weren't very fond of Rome, either America is now the heart of the flame. It is the great power of the West. And so Olympus is here. And we are here. "**

**It was all too much, especially the fact that I seemed to be included in Chiron's we, as if I were part of some club.**

**"Who are you, Chiron? Who ... Who am I?"**

"Wow Prissy only you would ask that," Clarisse told him. "Wait until next chapter," was all he said.

**Chiron smiled. He shifted his weight as if he were going to get up out of his wheelchair, but I knew that was impossible. He was paralyzed from the waist down. **

**"Who are you?" he mused. "Well, that's the question we all want answered, isn't it? But for now, we should get you a bunk in cabin eleven. There will be new friends to meet. And plenty of time for lessons tomorrow. Besides, there will be s'mores at the campfire tonight, and I simply adore chocolate. "**

"That's a bit of an understatement. Chiron LOVES chocolate," the greek demigods said.

**And then he did rise from his wheelchair. But there was something odd about the way he did it. His blanket fell away from his legs, but the legs didn't move. His waist kept getting longer, rising above his belt. At first, I thought he was wearing very long, white velvet underwear, but as he kept rising out of the chair, taller than any man, I realized that the velvet underwear wasn't underwear; it was the front of an animal, muscle and sinew under coarse white fur. And the wheelchair wasn't a chair. It was some kind of container, an enormous box on wheels, and it must've been magic, because there's no way it could've held all of him. A leg came out, long and knobby-kneed, with a huge polished hoof. Then another front leg, then hindquarters, and then the box was empty, nothing but a metal shell with a couple of fake human legs attached. **

**I stared at the horse who had just sprung from the wheelchair: a huge white stallion. But where its neck should be was the upper body of my Latin teacher, smoothly grafted to the horse's trunk. **

**"What a relief," the centaur said. "I'd been cooped up in there so long, my fetlocks had fallen asleep. Now, come, Percy Jackson. Let's meet the other campers. "**

"So that's that," Hazel said. "Who wants to read next?"

"Hey Percy?" Leo asked.

"What Leo?" Percy replied.

"With all of your amazingness and all that crap can you read?"

"I can…" Percy told Leo.

"Then you can read!" Leo shouted.

"Fine… Chapter 6 **I Become the Supreme Lord of the Bathroom**…"

"Hold on!" Jason screamed. "I'm sick and tired of everyone loving the oh so wonderful son of Poseidon! Oh my god I can move waves and talk to horses look at me! Can you all just stop worshiping that pathetic son of someone who isn't very powerful and probably didn't do half the things he did and look at me and Hercules who have done things to be proud of! I mean I defeated a Titan! Instead at praising someone who can do a couple petty parlor tricks look at someone with real power! ME!" Jason yelled. He was angry and was tired of everyone looking at Percy instead of him.

"Come on _Percy Jackson_! Let's see who's better shall we? The son of the mighty Zeus that has defeated a Titan or the son of someone who is second best and needs his father to make him look good!" Jason told Percy.

Jason got up, took out his sword, and charged.

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A/N: I hate ciffhangers but I just had to have one! I'll try and update sooner than usual so I can put you all oujt of your misery.


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N: I Own nothing! Thanks for all the reviews and I hope you like my story so far!**

* * *

Clash! The sound of sword hitting sword was the only thing you could hear in the throne room. Everyone not in the fight jumped at the sound. Hercules was cheering his brother on while everyone else, including Zeus and Ares, wanted Percy to kick Jason's butt.

Jason dove suddenly when Percy faked going for the left leg and instead, went for the right. Jason was losing fast and he knew it. _I'm the son of the mighty Zeus! I've defeated a Titan before! I can beat this pathetic excuse of a Demigod and I will._

Percy was slashing and stabbing very fast. He was a blur and the only reason why Jason had lasted as long as he did was because he didn't have any ill intent when it came to Jason, unlike Hercules. Poseidon was looking proudly at his son who he could tell was holding back.

Annabeth was of course furious with Jason for starting the fight. _Save some for me Percy because I'm going to wipe the floor with him!_

Leo as if he would do anything else, was recording the fight in slow motion with the new video camera he made during lunch. _This is going to be a huge hit back at camp! I wonder if I could partner with the Stolls and make a fortune selling this video? _

Said brothers were trying to get people to bet on who the winner was going to be but no one but Hercules was going to be against Percy and Hercules was to self-absorbed to bet. Percy noticed that they were trying to make bets so he made a tidal wave out of the water particles in the air and drenched them. Percy dried anyone who got hit with the wave but the Stolls.

"Soooooo not cool Perc!" the Stolls whined.

_I'm getting tired of fighting. I just want to sit down with Wise Girl and enjoy myself as much as I can when everyone is reading my private thoughts. _Percy thought to himself.

The battle was over quickly after that. A couple seconds after he thought that to himself Percy did the first move he learned at camp, the disarming maneuver. Jason's sword fell from his hand with a _clang_.

He stared wide eyed at the person who had just defeated him._ He cheated! A son of Poseidon could not even dream of beating a son of Zeus!_

"Who helped him cheat?!" Jason asked everyone. "I know that no son of Poseidon could ever hope to beat a son of Zeus so someone must have given this worthless Demigod a blessing of sort because you just didn't want to admit that your perfect hero isn't all that great!"

Jason realized his mistake when he said that Percy was worthless.

Annabeth charged at him. Percy saw this and too quickly for anyone to see, ran and hugged her to him.

"It's not worth it Wise Girl," Percy muttered to his angry girlfriend.

"Of course it is you Seaweed Brain!" Annabeth whispered furiously back.

"He can think that all he wants but no one in this room believes him so let him be. As long as nothing bad happens, what harm can he do except slander my name and reputation which I don't care about as long as I have you and my friends," Percy told her.

"Fine but I still don't like it," Annabeth grumbled.

"And you don't have to," Percy answered back. "Now that that's over with who wants to read next?"

That seemed to snap everyone out of their thoughts.

"I do believe you were about to Kelp Head," Thalia said.

"Oh yah…" Percy smiled sheepishly.

"Oh Clarisse I think you are going to like this chapter!" Percy exclaimed and without waiting for a reply "Chapter 6** I Become the Supreme Lord of the Bathroom**…"

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**Another Chapter done! Sorry but it might take awhile to get my next chapter up because I've got a presentation coming up and that is also why this took so long to get up!**


	9. Chapter 9

**Hey sorry for anyone who thought this was an update but I ask you to please read this because it is important for this story and your enjoyment. First of all, I apologize for not updating but I have to get ready for my moving up grades and entering a new school. For all those who have done this switch, you might know how long it takes and how stressful it might be. I shall update soon after I get a good number of answers. This leads me to my second topic. I have now opened a poll asking what you want in this story. I am not changing how the characters act but I would like to know if you want me to add things like Percy fighting a huge battle or Percy getting a curse that makes him have all of his past injuries. I ask you to please take my poll. It should only take about a minute if that to take. I beg you to please please please take my poll because your opinion matters greatly to me! :D:D:D:D**

**~Percabeth4life~**


	10. Chapter 10

**IMPORTANT AUTHOR'S NOTE! Please read!**

**I'm sorry to anyone who thought that this was a chapter. I have the poll results here and I am now in the middle of working on the next chapter! I wish for all my readers to know that even if the one you wanted wasn't chosen, I have decided to do more than one at a later point! I ask that if you greatly dislike the result of the poll, that you still read and skip over those parts because I will try not to make the fic centered around the result of the poll. I hope that you keep reading my story as I should be able to update more since it is the summer!**

**Here are the results of the Poll!**

**1. The curse: 35 votes**

**2. The huge battle: 24 votes**

**3. Enemies come and attack the throne room: 14**

**4. Keep it the way it is: 11**

**5. Send past heroes back: 3**

**6. Percy gets another quest: 3**

**The Curse is the winner so that is the one I will be writing into the story first! The poll is now closed and I thank everyone for voting! I apologize if you do not like where this story is heading and I still hope that you keep on reading!**

**Thanks to everyone who reads my story!**

**~Percabeth4life~**


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N: Hey everyone! I've finally got the chapter posted! I would've had it done sooner, but first the internet crashed and then my dog jumped onto my keyboard while I was typing and it deleted the whole chapter! I recovered the part that was saved though, so it wasn't that bad... Anyway thanks to anyone who reviewed and I hope everyone loves the new chapter! **

* * *

Before Percy could start reading though, a note fell to Annabeth's lap. She picked it up and scanned it. Her face paled until she looked like a ghost. She looked at Percy then back to the note. She started to sob. Annabeth ran to Percy and confused, Percy took his girlfriend in his arms making comforting sounds. Thalia picked up the note. She read it to everyone.

_Heroes and Olympians,_

_We forgot to tell you that there is a price to pay for reading these books. Since we cannot do anything drastic, because it might change the future, we have decided on putting Percy under a curse where he will have to relive all of his past injuries as they are read. The injury will not go away until it does in the book. There will be no lasting damage however._

_ Sincerely,_

_ The Fates_

Percy paled after hearing this along with everyone else who knew about some of the injuries that he had gotten during the quests. Percy swallowed and said,

"Well it shouldn't come in until later right? Let's just keep reading since there is nothing we can do about it."

With that said, Percy took the book and started to read for the third time.

**Once I got over the fact that my Latin teacher was a horse, we had a nice tour, though I was careful not to walk behind him. I'd done pooper-scooper patrol in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade a few times, and, I'm sorry, I did not trust Chiron's back end the way I trusted his front.**

Percy got smacked for that comment by Annabeth while some other people *cough* The Stolls, Hermes, Apollo, and Leo *cough* were laughing.

**We passed the volleyball pit. Several of the campers nudged each other. One pointed to the minotaur horn I was carrying. Another said, "That's him. "**

"That was me!" Connor exclaimed. "No it wasn't! It was me!" Travis countered. They promptly got into a fight on who was there. Percy made a bubble of water appear over their heads and dropped it on them. "Perc! That was not cool!"

Most of the campers were older than me. Their satyr friends were bigger than Grover, all of them trotting around in orange CAMP HALF-BLOOD T-shirts, with nothing else to cover their bare shaggy hindquarters. I wasn't normally shy, but the way they stared at me made me uncomfortable. I felt like they were expecting me to do a flip or something.

"Can you do one cause that would be really cool!" Leo said.

Instead of answering, Percy got up and walked a little bit away from everyone else. He then ran and did a series of back flips. They gawked at him.

_He must have some help! _Jason seethed. He just couldn't believe that someone was more powerful than him. _I defeated a Titan and I can't even do that!_

Poseidon was proud of his son. _He is going to be a greater hero than Hercules._

Percy just walked over to Annabeth and kissed her. Once Annabeth was out of breath, he picked up the book and started to read with Annabeth on his lap.

I looked back at the farmhouse. It was a lot bigger than I'd realized-four stories tall, sky blue with white trim, like an upscale seaside resort. I was checking out the brass eagle weather vane on top when something caught my eye, a shadow in the uppermost window of the attic gable. Something had moved the curtain, just for a second, and I got the distinct impression I was being watched. "What's up there?" I asked Chiron. He looked where I was pointing, and his smile faded. "Just the attic."

**"Somebody lives there?"  
"No, "he said with finality."Not a single living thing. "**

"That was true at the time," Annabeth mused.**  
I got the feeling he was being truthful. But I was also sure something had moved that curtain. **

"That's impossible," Apollo stated confused. _The Oracle hasn't been able to move in a very long time._**  
"Come along, Percy, "Chiron said, his lighthearted tone now a little forced. "Lots to see. "  
We walked through the strawberry fields, where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe.  
Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and Mount Olympus. "It pays our expenses," he explained. "And the strawberries take almost no effort. "**

Katie smiled as it was read.**  
He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead. I watched the satyr playing his pipe. His music was causing lines of bugs to leave the strawberry patch in every direction, like refugees fleeing a fire. I wondered if Grover could work that kind of magic with music. I wondered if he was still inside the farmhouse, getting chewed out by Mr. D. **

"Thanks for worrying!" Grover exclaimed. "Of course we care goat boy!" Thalia exclaimed.**  
"Grover won't get in too much trouble, will he?" I asked Chiron. "I mean ... He was a good protector. Really. "  
Chiron sighed. He shed his tweed jacket and draped it over his horses back like a saddle. "Grover has big dreams, Percy. Perhaps bigger than are reasonable. To reach his goal, he must first demonstrate great courage by succeeding as a keeper, finding a new camper and bringing him safely to Half-Blood Hill. "**

**"But he did that!"**

**"I might agree with you," Chiron said. "But it is not my place to judge. Dionysus and the Council of Cloven Elders must decide. I'm afraid they might not see this assignment as a success. After all, Grover lost you in New York. Then there's the unfortunate ... Ah ... Fate of your mother. And the fact that Grover was unconscious when you dragged him over the property line. The council might question whether this shows any courage on Grover's part. "  
I wanted to protest. None of what happened was Grover's fault. I also felt really, really guilty. If I hadn't given Grover the slip at the bus station, he might not have gotten in trouble. **

"Don't blame yourself Perc," Grover told said guy. Percy just nodded not meaning it. _No matter what they say it is still my fault._

**"He'll get a second chance, won't he?"**

Everyone who knew what happened looked down.

**Chiron winced. "I'm afraid that was Grover's second chance, Percy. The council was not anxious to give him another, either, after what happened the first time, five years ago. Olympus knows, I advised him to wait longer before trying again. He's still so small for his age... "  
"How old is he?"  
"Oh, twenty-eight."  
"What! And he's in sixth grade?"**

"I feel for you man! I would die!" Travis exclaimed. His brother and Leo nodded in agreement.

**"Satyrs mature half as fast as humans, Percy. Grover has been the equivalent of a middle school student for the past six years." **

**"That's horrible." **

**"Quite," Chiron agreed. "At any rate, Grover is a late bloomer, even by satyr standards, and not yet very accomplished at woodland magic. Alas, he was anxious to pursue his dream. Perhaps now he will find some other career..." **

"Never!" Grover shouted. "You did show them G-man," Percy told him. The gods, heroes of old, and the lost hero trio were confused. Hazel and Frank were already filled in with what had happened.

**"That's not fair," I said. "What happened the first time? Was it really so bad?" Chiron looked away quickly. "Let's move along, shall we?" **

**But I wasn't quite ready to let the subject drop. Something had occurred to me when Chiron talked about my mother's fate, as if he were intentionally avoiding the word **_**death. **_**The beginnings of an idea—a tiny, hopeful fire—started forming in my mind. **

Annabeth groaned and Percy just smiled sheepishly.

**"Chiron," I said. "If the gods and Olympus and all that are real ..." **

**"Yes, child?" **

**"Does that mean the Underworld is real, too?" **

"Don't you dare be thinking what I think you're thinking," Thalia warned Percy.

**Chiron's expression darkened. **

**"Yes, child." He paused, as if choosing his words carefully. "There is a place where spirits go after death. But for now ... until we know more . . . I would urge you to put that out of your mind." **

**"What do you mean, 'until we know more'?" **

**"Come, Percy. Let's see the woods." **

"Chiron might be able to lie but he is horrible at changing the subject. Boys you must teach him how!" Hermes told his sons who were nodding furiously.

**As we got closer, I realized how huge the forest was. It took up at least a quarter of the valley, with trees so tall and thick, you could imagine nobody had been in there since the Native Americans. **

**Chiron said, "The woods are stocked, if you care to try your luck, but go armed." **

**"Stocked with what?" I asked. "Armed with what?" **

"Swords of course," Clarisse told Percy. _He is really dumb._ Jason and Hercules thought.

**"You'll see. Capture the flag is Friday night. Do you have your own sword and shield?" **

**"My own—?" **

**"No," Chiron said. "I don't suppose you do. I think a size five will do. I'll visit the armory later." **

**I wanted to ask what kind of summer camp had an armory, but there was too much else to think about, so the tour continued. We saw the archery range, the canoeing lake, the stables (which Chiron didn't seem to like very much), the javelin range, the sing-along amphitheater, and the arena where Chiron said they held sword and spear fights. **

**"Sword and spear fights?" I asked. **

**"Cabin challenges and all that," he explained. "Not lethal. Usually. Oh, yes, and there's the mess hall." **

"Way to scare him," Rachel said.

**Chiron pointed to an outdoor pavilion framed in white Grecian columns on a hill overlooking the sea. There were a dozen stone picnic tables. No roof. No walls. **

**"What do you do when it rains?" I asked.**

"I wondered that too," Leo told everyone.

**Chiron looked at me as if I'd gone a little weird. "We still have to eat, don't we?" I decided to drop the subject. **

"The world is going to end! Percy did something smart!" the Stolls dramatically exclaimed. On cue, they got soaked and slapped.

**Finally, he showed me the cabins. There were twelve of them, nestled in the woods by the lake.**

"There were more weren't there?" Piper asked. Annabeth nodded and told her, "Later."

**They were arranged in a U, with two at the base and five in a row on either side. And they were without doubt the most bizarre collection of buildings I'd ever seen. Except for the fact that each had a large brass number above the door (odds on the left side, evens on the right), they looked absolutely nothing alike. Number nine had smokestacks, like a tiny factory. Number four had tomato vines on the walls and a roof made out of real grass. Seven seemed to be made of solid gold, which gleamed so much in the sunlight it was almost impossible to look at. **

The Olympians and their children of each cabin mentioned cheered when their cabin was described.

**They all faced a commons area about the size of a soccer field, dotted with Greek statues, fountains, flower beds, and a couple of basketball hoops (which were more my speed). **

"I've seen him play once and he was really good!" Nico exclaimed.

**In the center of the field was a huge stone-lined firepit. Even though it was a warm afternoon, the hearth smoldered. A girl about nine years old was tending the flames, poking the coals with a stick. **

Hestia smiled warmly at Percy who smiled back and waved.

**The pair of cabins at the head of the field, numbers one and two, looked like his-and-hers mausoleums, big white marble boxes with heavy columns in front. Cabin one was the biggest and bulkiest of the twelve. Its polished bronze doors shimmered like a hologram, so that from different angles lightning bolts seemed to streak across them. Cabin two was more graceful somehow, with slimmer columns garlanded with pomegranates and flowers. The walls were carved with images of peacocks. **

**"Zeus and Hera?" I guessed. **

**"Correct," Chiron said. **

**"Their cabins look empty." **

**"Several of the cabins are. That's true. No one ever stays in one or two." Okay. So each cabin had a different god, like a mascot. Twelve cabins for the twelve Olympians. But why would some be empty? **

**I stopped in front of the first cabin on the left, cabin three. **

Percy smiled at Poseidon who returned the gesture.

**It wasn't high and mighty like cabin one, but long and low and solid. The outer walls were of rough gray stone studded with pieces of seashell and coral, as if the slabs had been hewn straight from the bottom of the ocean floor. I peeked inside the open doorway and Chiron said, "Oh, I wouldn't do that!" **

"Let him be Chiron," Poseidon said.

**Before he could pull me back, I caught the salty scent of the interior, like the wind on the shore at Montauk. The interior walls glowed like abalone. There were six empty bunk beds with silk sheets turned down. But there was no sign anyone had ever slept there. The place felt so sad and lonely, I was glad when Chiron put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Come along, Percy." Most of the other cabins were crowded with campers. **

**Number five was bright red—a real nasty paint job, as if the color had been splashed on with buckets and fists. The roof was lined with barbed wire. A stuffed wild boar's head hung over the doorway, and its eyes seemed to follow me. Inside I could see a bunch of mean-looking kids, both girls and boys, arm wrestling and arguing with each other while rock music blared. The loudest was a girl maybe thirteen or fourteen. She wore a size XXXL CAMP HALF-BLOOD Tshirt under a camouflage jacket. She zeroed in on me and gave me an evil sneer. She reminded me of Nancy Bobofit, though the camper girl was much bigger and tougher looking, and her hair was long and stringy, and brown instead of red. **

Clarisse smiled smugly at the mention of her cabin and herself.

**I kept walking, trying to stay clear of Chiron's hooves. "We haven't seen any other centaurs," I observed. **

**"No," said Chiron sadly. "My kinsmen are a wild and barbaric folk, I'm afraid. You might encounter them in the wilderness, or at major sporting events. But you won't see any here." **

**"You said your name was Chiron. Are you really ..." **

**He smiled down at me. **_**"The **_**Chiron from the stories? Trainer of Hercules and all that? Yes, Percy, I am." **

"He is great," the Heroes of Old said. Everyone who was taught under Chiron agreed.

**"But, shouldn't you be dead?" **

Annabeth slapped Percy.

**Chiron paused, as if the question intrigued him. "I honestly don't know about **_**should **_**be. The truth is, I **_**can't **_**be dead. You see, eons ago the gods granted my wish. I could continue the work I loved. I could be a teacher of heroes as long as humanity needed me. I gained much from that wish ... and I gave up much. But I'm still here, so I can only assume I'm still needed." I thought about being a teacher for three thousand years. It wouldn't have made my Top Ten Things to Wish For list. **

Athena just glared at Percy. _Why my daughter is dating him…_

**"Doesn't it ever get boring?" **

**"No, no," he said. "Horribly depressing, at times, but never boring." **

**"Why depressing?" **

**Chiron seemed to turn hard of hearing again. **

**"Oh, look," he said. "Annabeth is waiting for us." **

**The blond girl I'd met at the Big House was reading a book in front of the last cabin on the left, number eleven. **

**When we reached her, she looked me over critically, like she was still thinking about how much I drooled. **

**I tried to see what she was reading, but I couldn't make out the title. I thought my dyslexia was acting up. Then I realized the title wasn't even English. The letters looked Greek to me. I mean, literally Greek. **

"What else was it going to be, Spanish?" Thalia asked Percy who just shrugged at her.

**There were pictures of temples and statues and different kinds of columns, like those in an architecture book. **

Annabeth sighed after hearing this. Percy hugged her close.

**"Annabeth," Chiron said, "I have masters' archery class at noon. Would you take Percy from here?" **

**"Yes, sir." **

**"Cabin eleven," Chiron told me, gesturing toward the doorway. "Make yourself at home." Out of all the cabins, eleven looked the most like a regular old summer camp cabin, with the emphasis on **_**old. **_**The threshold was worn down, the brown paint peeling. **

"Hey!" the Stolls and their father yelled.

**Over the doorway was one of those doctor's symbols, a winged pole with two snakes wrapped around it. What did they call it... ? **

"A caduceus," Hermes told everyone.

**A caduceus. **

"NOOOOO our own dad has PJS! Are we going to be next?" the stolls started to sob dramatically.

**Inside, it was packed with people, both boys and girls, way more than the number of bunk beds. Sleeping bags were spread all over on the floor. It looked like a gym where the Red Cross had set up an evacuation center. **

"You really need to claim your children," Hermes frowned at the Olympians who had kids. They looked down in shame. They snapped their fingers and claimed their children.

**Chiron didn't go in. The door was too low for him. But when the campers saw him they all stood and bowed respectfully. **

**"Well, then," Chiron said. "Good luck, Percy. I'll see you at dinner." He galloped away toward the archery range. **

**I stood in the doorway, looking at the kids. They weren't bowing anymore. They were staring at me, sizing me up. I knew this routine. I'd gone through it at enough schools. **

Annabeth looked at Percy sadly at this. Percy just smiled and kissed her.

**"Well?" Annabeth prompted. "Go on." **

**So naturally I tripped coming in the door and made a total fool of myself. **

"Naturally!" Thalia screamed. Everyone who knew Percy laughed and some of the gods (you know the ones) laughed. _Of course he would make a fool of himself since he is one! _Jason thought.

**There were some snickers from the campers, but none of them said anything. **

**Annabeth announced, "Percy Jackson, meet cabin eleven. **

**"Regular or undetermined?" somebody asked. **

**I didn't know what to say, but Annabeth said, "Undetermined." Everybody groaned. **

The Olympians looked down in shame. "I didn't know it was this bad," Apollo muttered.

"A lot of Demigods believe that you guys don't care about them because they either don't get claimed by you or they never hear from you. I think that everyone would be better off if you guys started to claim your kids before the monsters start to go after them," Percy told the Olympians.

"He's right father. That is very wise Perseus Jackson," Athena told Zeus then Percy.

_What does she know!" _Hercules thought.

**A guy who was a little older than the rest came forward. **

Percy got Thalia and sat her next to him so he then had his cousin and girlfriend on either side of him. Thalia smiled at him sadly.

**"Now, now, campers. That's what we're here for. Welcome, Percy. You can have that spot on the floor, right over there." The guy was about nineteen, and he looked pretty cool. He was tall and muscular, with shortcropped sandy hair and a friendly smile. He wore an orange tank top, cutoffs, sandals, and a leather necklace with five different-colored clay beads. The only thing unsettling about his appearance was a thick white scar that ran from just beneath his right eye to his jaw, like an old knife slash. **

Percy hugged Annabeth and Thalia closer to him. "Luke," Hermes whispered.

**"This is Luke," Annabeth said, and her voice sounded different somehow. I glanced over and could've sworn she was blushing. **

Percy kissed Annabeth to remind himself that he didn't have to feel jealous.

**She saw me looking, and her expression hardened again. "He's your counselor for now." **

**"For now?" I asked. **

**"You're undetermined," Luke explained patiently. "They don't know what cabin to put you in, so you're here. Cabin eleven takes all newcomers, all visitors. Naturally, we would. Hermes, our patron, is the god of travelers." **

Hermes smiled at that.

**I looked at the tiny section of floor they'd given me. I had nothing to put there to mark it as my own, no luggage, no clothes, no sleeping bag. Just the Minotaur's horn. I thought about setting that down, but then I remembered that Hermes was also the god of thieves.**

"Awwww! That would've been so cool to steel!" the Stolls exclaimed. "Why don't you steel it now?" Leo wondered.

"We've tried. Percy noticed right away and came looking for us. He used water to hang us in the mess hall with only boxers that were white with pink hearts on them. Perc wouldn't let us down for 3 days and this was during his first year too. We never tried again!" Travis and Connor said embarrassingly. Percy smile smugly. Poseidon was proud and Hermes, Apollo, and Leo cracked up.

_There is no way he did that! They are so making that up!_ Jason and Hercules thought.

**I looked around at the campers' faces, some sullen and suspicious, some grinning stupidly, some eyeing me as if they were waiting for a chance to pick my pockets. **

"Those are mine!" Hermes yelled proudly.

**"How long will I be here?" I asked. **

**"Good question," Luke said. "Until you're determined." **

**"How long will that take?" **

**The campers all laughed. **

**"Come on," Annabeth told me. "I'll show you the volleyball court." **

**"I've already seen it." **

**"Come on." She grabbed my wrist and dragged me outside. I could hear the kids of cabin eleven laughing behind me. **

"You need to take a hint Kelp Head," Thalia said a little better.

**When we were a few feet away, Annabeth said, "Jackson, you have to do better than that." **

**"What?" **

**She rolled her eyes and mumbled under her breath, "I can't believe I thought you were the one." **

"Oh but he is the one!" the Stolls exclaimed. They got slapped by a blushing Annabeth.

**"What's your problem?" I was getting angry now. "All I know is, I kill some bull guy—" **

"I am so going to call him that next time I see him!" Percy exclaimed.

**"Don't talk like that!" Annabeth told me. "You know how many kids at this camp wish they'd had your chance?" **

**"To get killed?" **

**"To fight the Minotaur! What do you think we train for?" **

"I don't wish that now," Annabeth muttered after Piper looked at her.

**I shook my head. "Look, if the thing I fought really was **_**the **_**Minotaur, the same one in the stories ..." **

**"Yes." **

**"Then there's only one." **

**"Yes." **

**"And he died, like, a gajillion years ago, right? Theseus killed him in the labyrinth. So ..." **

Theseus smiled at his only big accomplishment also happy that his little brother knew about him.

**"Monsters don't die, Percy. They can be killed. But they don't die." **

**"Oh, thanks. That clears it up." **

"He's got you there," Nico told Annabeth. She glared at him and held the hilt of her knife. Nico gulped.

**"They don't have souls, like you and me. You can dispel them for a while, maybe even for a whole lifetime if you're lucky. But they are primal forces. Chiron calls them archetypes. Eventually, they re-form." **

**I thought about Mrs. Dodds. "You mean if I killed one, accidentally, with a sword—" **

**"The Fur ... I mean, your math teacher. That's right. She's still out there. You just made her very, very mad." **

**"How did you know about Mrs. Dodds?" **

**"You talk in your sleep." **

Annabeth kissed her boyfriend.

**"You almost called her something. A Fury? They're Hades' torturers, right?" Annabeth glanced nervously at the ground, as if she expected it to open up and swallow her. **

"Can that happen?" Hazel asked Hades who just smiled mysteriously.

**"You shouldn't call them by name, even here. We call them the Kindly Ones, if we have to speak of them at all." **

**"Look, is there anything we **_**can **_**say without it thundering?" I sounded whiny, even to myself, but right then I didn't care. "Why do I have to stay in cabin eleven, anyway? Why is everybody so crowded together? There are plenty of empty bunks right over there." I pointed to the first few cabins, and Annabeth turned pale. "You don't just choose a cabin, Percy. It depends on who your parents are. Or ... your parent." **

**She stared at me, waiting for me to get it. **

**"My mom is Sally Jackson," I said. "She works at the candy store in Grand Central Station. At least, she used to." **

Percy looked down.

**"I'm sorry about your mom, Percy. But that's not what I mean. I'm talking about your other parent. Your dad." **

**"He's dead. I never knew him." **

Poseidon winced.

**Annabeth sighed. Clearly, she'd had this conversation before with other kids. "Your father's not dead, Percy." **

**"How can you say that? You know him?" **

"You do now! I'm Poseidon nice to meet you!" Poseidon said to Annabeth who played along. Athena rolled her eyes.

**"No, of course not." **

**"Then how can you say—" **

**"Because I know **_**you. **_**You wouldn't be here if you weren't one of us." **

"That makes it sound like we're part of a secret society or something," Leo said.

**"You don't know anything about me." **

**"No?" She raised an eyebrow. "I bet you moved around from school to school. I bet you were kicked out of a lot of them." **

"That was right on Annabeth! Nice job!" Thalia congratulated her friend.

**"How—" **

**"Diagnosed with dyslexia. Probably ADHD, too." **

**I tried to swallow my embarrassment. "What does that have to do with anything?" **

**"Taken together, it's almost a sure sign. The letters float off the page when you read, right? **

**That's because your mind is hardwired for ancient Greek. And the ADHD—you're impulsive, can't sit still in the classroom. That's your battlefield reflexes. In a real fight, they'd keep you alive. As for the attention problems, that's because you see too much, Percy, not too little. Your senses are better than a regular mortal's. Of course the teachers want you medicated. Most of them are monsters. They don't want you seeing them for what they are." **

**"You sound like ... you went through the same thing?" **

**"Most of the kids here did. If you weren't like us, you couldn't have survived the Minotaur, much less the ambrosia and nectar." **

**"Ambrosia and nectar." **

**"The food and drink we were giving you to make you better. That stuff would've killed a normal kid. It would've turned your blood to fire and your bones to sand and you'd be dead. Face it. You're a half-blood." **

"That sounded like you rehearsed that," Piper told Annabeth. "I had to do that a lot," was her reply.

**A half-blood. **

**I was reeling with so many questions I didn't know where to start. **

**Then a husky voice yelled, "Well! A newbie!" **

"Enter Clarisse," the Stolls announced.

**I looked over. The big girl from the ugly red cabin was sauntering toward us. She had three other girls behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her, all wearing camo jackets. **

Clarisse growled.

**"Clarisse," Annabeth sighed. "Why don't you go polish your spear or something?" **

**"Sure, Miss Princess," the big girl said. "So I can run you through with it Friday night." **

_**''Erre es korakas!" **_**Annabeth said, which I somehow understood was Greek for 'Go to the crows!' though I had a feeling it was a worse curse than it sounded. "You don't stand a chance." **

**"We'll pulverize you," Clarisse said, but her eye twitched. Perhaps she wasn't sure she could follow through on the threat. She turned toward me. "Who's this little runt?" **

**"Percy Jackson," Annabeth said, "meet Clarisse, Daughter of Ares." I blinked. "Like ... the war god?" **

"Got a problem with that?" Ares sneered.

**Clarisse sneered. "You got a problem with that?"**

No one said anything in fear of Ares and his daughter.

**"No," I said, recovering my wits. "It explains the bad smell." **

Nico and Percy high fived while the usual people laughed.

**Clarisse growled. "We got an initiation ceremony for newbies, Prissy." **

"I was wondering where that one came from," Travis said.

**"Percy." **

**"Whatever. Come on, I'll show you." **

**"Clarisse—" Annabeth tried to say. **

**"Stay out of it, wise girl." **

"That's where the nickname came from? I knew you didn't come up with that on your own!" Thalia laughed.

**Annabeth looked pained, but she did stay out of it, and I didn't really want her help. I was the new kid. I had to earn my own rep. **

Ares was nodding along with that until he remembered who said it.

**I handed Annabeth my minotaur horn and got ready to fight, but before I knew it, Clarisse had me by the neck and was dragging me toward a cinder-block building that I knew immediately was the bathroom. **

"This should be good!" Connor exclaimed rubbing his hands together.

**I was kicking and punching. I'd been in plenty of fights before, but this big girl Clarisse had hands like iron. **

Clarisse took that as a compliment.

**She dragged me into the girls' bathroom. There was a line of toilets on one side and a line of shower stalls down the other. It smelled just like any public bathroom, and I was thinking—as much as I **_**could **_**think with Clarisse ripping my hair out—that if this place belonged to the gods, they should've been able to afford classier johns. **

Everyone laughed while Jason rolled his eyes.

**Clarisse's friends were all laughing, and I was trying to find the strength I'd used to fight the Minotaur, but it just wasn't there. **

**"Like he's 'Big Three' material," Clarisse said as she pushed me toward one of the toilets. **

Annabeth glared at Clarisse while Jason and Hercules looked like they agreed with the statement.

**"Yeah, right. Minotaur probably fell over laughing, he was so stupid looking." Her friends snickered. **

_He doesn't look so stupid now… even back then he looked pretty cute. _ Annabeth thought while kissing Percy on the cheek.

**Annabeth stood in the corner, watching through her fingers. **

"I wasn't!" Annabeth told her boyfriend who got a smack.

**Clarisse bent me over on my knees and started pushing my head toward the toilet bowl. It reeked like rusted pipes and, well, like what goes into toilets. **

_What an idiot. _Jason thought to himself.

**I strained to keep my head up. I was looking at the scummy water, thinking, I will not go into that. I won't. Then something happened. I felt a tug in the pit of my stomach. **

Percy smirked and Poseidon smiled the I-know-something-that-you-don't smile.

**I heard the plumbing rumble, the pipes shudder. Clarisse's grip on my hair loosened. Water shot out of the toilet, making an arc straight over my head, and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled on the bathroom tiles with Clarisse screaming behind me. **

"I wish I had that on camera!" Travis told Connor who agreed. They soon got punched from a growling Clarisse, "not a word!"

**I turned just as water blasted out of the toilet again, hitting Clarisse straight in the face so hard it pushed her down onto her butt.**

The two gods and three demigods who we all know are troublemakers couldn't keep their laughter in and Clarisse glared at all of them. Even though it is 100 times worse than Percy's, they stopped laughing.

**The water stayed on her like the spray from a fire hose, pushing her backward into a shower stall. **

The same five mentioned above tried to stop from snickering.

**She struggled, gasping, and her friends started coming toward her. But then the other toilets exploded, too, and six more streams of toilet water blasted them back. The showers acted up, too, and together all the fixtures sprayed the camouflage girls right out of the bathroom, spinning them around like pieces of garbage being washed away. **

"That's soooooooooo cool! I wish I could do something like that!" Leo said awed.

_He is very powerful to be able to do that without any training what so ever. _Athena mused to herself

_Someone helped him cause he is an idiot and can't be more powerful than a son of Zeus! _Jason and Hercules thought.

Percy's brothers from the past couldn't help but feel a little jealous but they were also proud that it was their little brother who was doing that.

Everyone else just stared shocked at Percy except for Annabeth who just smiled proudly. Percy blushed under the stares.

_Interesting… a boy who is humbler than the others._ Artemis thought.

**As soon as they were out the door, I felt the tug in my gut lessen, and the water shut off as quickly as it had started. **

"Still cool," Leo muttered.

**The entire bathroom was flooded. Annabeth hadn't been spared. She was dripping wet, but she hadn't been pushed out the door. **

_*SLAP* _"HEY! What was that for?!" Percy exclaimed to his girlfriend. "I never got you for that," was his only reply.

**She was standing in exactly the same place, staring at me in shock. **

"I would be too," Piper, Hazel, and Frank said.

**I looked down and realized I was sitting in the only dry spot in the whole room. **

"I can't believe I didn't figure it out sooner!" Annabeth shouted angry with herself.

_I'm supposed to be a daughter of Athena! How could I not have figured it out sooner? _She thought to herself and Percy, knowing what she was thinking, quickly kissed her and told her not to feel bad because no one else figured it out.

**There was a circle of dry floor around me. I didn't have one drop of water on my clothes. Nothing. **

"That would be so useful! Not being able to get wet!" Rachel said.

**I stood up, my legs shaky. **

**Annabeth said, "How did you ..." **

"You actually thought Kelp Head here would know what he did?" Thalia asked her friend while Nico nodded in agreement to what Thalia said.

Percy pouted.

**"I don't know." **

"No surprise there," Nico said. He got trapped in a water bubble, got floated 50 feet in the air, then dropped into a freezing pool of water. He got out freezing and glaring at Percy. Who smiled and snapped his fingers, making his clothes dry.

When asked, he told everyone, "I just heated up the water." Needless to say, there were two jealous demigods thinking that he had help, 10 shocked Olympians, 1 smiling Olympian who was around the Hearth, 1 proud Olympian, and a kissing couple by which I am named after.

**We walked to the door. Outside, Clarisse and her friends were sprawled in the mud, and a bunch of other campers had gathered around to gawk. **

"Of course we did! No one had ever done that before!" The Stolls exclaimed. Katie slapped them on the back of the heads.

**Clarisse's hair was flattened across her face. Her camouflage jacket was sopping and she smelled like sewage. **

Aphrodite crinkled her nose.

**She gave me a look of absolute hatred. "You are dead, new boy. You are totally dead." I probably should have let it go, but I said, "You want to gargle with toilet water again, Clarisse? Close your mouth." **

The 5 troublemakers started crying from laughter while everyone else just laughed normally. Even Clarisse had a small smile from the remark.

**Her friends had to hold her back. They dragged her toward cabin five, while the other campers made way to avoid her flailing feet. **

**Annabeth stared at me. I couldn't tell whether she was just grossed out or angry at me for dousing her. **

"A little bit of both," Annabeth told her boyfriend who just smiled sheepishly and kissed her.

**"What?" I demanded. "What are you thinking?" **

**"I'm thinking," she said, "that I want you on my team for capture the flag."**

"And that's it!" Percy closed the book after reading his second chapter. "Who's reading next?" he asked.

"I will," Frank said. "Chapter 7 **My dinner goes up in smoke**…"

* * *

**Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed reading it and I'll start working on the next chapter after I come back from the vacation I'm going on! :D**


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